Compositions and method for measuring and calibrating amplification bias in multiplexed pcr reactions

ABSTRACT

Compositions and methods are described for standardizing the DNA amplification efficiencies of a highly heterogeneous set of oligonucleotide primers as may typically be used to amplify a heterogeneous set of DNA templates that contains rearranged lymphoid cell DNA encoding T cell receptors (TCR) or immunoglobulins (IG). The presently disclosed embodiments are useful to overcome undesirable bias in the utilization of a subset of amplification primers, which leads to imprecision in multiplexed high throughput sequencing of amplification products to quantify unique TCR or Ig encoding genomes in a sample. Provided is a composition comprising a diverse plurality of template oligonucleotides in substantially equimolar amounts, for use as a calibration standard for amplification primer sets. Also provided are methods for identifying and correcting biased primer efficiency during amplification.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/726,489, filed Nov. 14, 2012 and U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/644,294, filed on May 8, 2012, the entire disclosures of which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entireties for all purposes.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present disclosure relates generally to quantitative high-throughput sequencing of adaptive immune receptor encoding DNA (e.g., DNA encoding T cell receptors (TCR) and immunoglobulins (IG) in multiplexed nucleic acid amplification reactions. In particular, the compositions and methods described herein overcome undesirable distortions in the quantification of adaptive immune receptor encoding sequences that can result from biased over-utilization and/or under-utilization of specific oligonucleotide primers in multiplexed DNA amplification.

2. Description of the Related Art

The adaptive immune system employs several strategies to generate a repertoire of T- and B-cell antigen receptors, i.e., adaptive immune receptors, with sufficient diversity to recognize the universe of potential pathogens. The ability of T cells to recognize the universe of antigens associated with various cancers or infectious organisms is conferred by its T cell antigen receptor (TCR), which is a heterodimer of an a (alpha) chain from the TCRA locus and a β (beta) chain from the TCRB locus, or a heterodimer of a γ (gamma) chain from the TCRG locus and a δ (delta) chain from the TCRD locus. The proteins which make up these chains are encoded by DNA, which in lymphoid cells employs a unique rearrangement mechanism for generating the tremendous diversity of the TCR. This multi-subunit immune recognition receptor associates with the CD3 complex and binds to peptides presented by either the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I or MHC class II proteins on the surface of antigen-presenting cells (APCs). Binding of TCR to the antigenic peptide on the APC is the central event in T cell activation, which occurs at an immunological synapse at the point of contact between the T cell and the APC.

Each TCR peptide contains variable complementarity determining regions (CDRs), as well as framework regions (FRs) and a constant region. The sequence diversity of αβ T cells is largely determined by the amino acid sequence of the third complementarity-determining region (CDR3) loops of the α and β chain variable domains, which diversity is a result of recombination between variable (V_(β)), diversity (D_(β)), and joining (J_(β)) gene segments in the β chain locus, and between analogous V_(α) and J_(α) gene segments in the α chain locus, respectively. The existence of multiple such gene segments in the TCR α and β chain loci allows for a large number of distinct CDR3 sequences to be encoded. CDR3 sequence diversity is further increased by independent addition and deletion of nucleotides at the V_(β)-D_(β), D_(β)-J_(β), and V_(α)-J_(α) junctions during the process of TCR gene rearrangement. In this respect, immunocompetence is derived from the diversity of TCRs.

The γδ TCR heterodimer is distinctive from the αβ TCR in that it encodes a receptor that interacts closely with the innate immune system, and recognizes antigen in a non-HLA-dependent manner. TCRγδ is expressed early in development, and has specialized anatomical distribution, unique pathogen and small-molecule specificities, and a broad spectrum of innate and adaptive cellular interactions. A biased pattern of TCRγ V and J segment expression is established early in ontogeny. Consequently, the diverse TCRγ repertoire in adult tissues is the result of extensive peripheral expansion following stimulation by environmental exposure to pathogens and toxic molecules.

Immunoglobulins (Igs or IG), also referred to herein as B cell receptors (BCR), are proteins expressed by B cells consisting of four polypeptide chains, two heavy chains (H chains) from the IGH locus and two light chains (L chains) from either the IGK or the IGL locus, forming an H₂L₂ structure. H and L chains each contain three complementarity determining regions (CDR) involved in antigen recognition, as well as framework regions and a constant domain, analogous to TCR. The H chains of Igs are initially expressed as membrane-bound isoforms using either the IGM or IGD constant region exons, but after antigen recognition the constant region can class-switch to several additional isotypes, including IGG, IGE and IGA. As with TCR, the diversity of naïve Igs within an individual is mainly determined by the hypervariable complementarity determining regions (CDR). Similar to TCRB, the CDR3 domain of H chains is created by the combinatorial joining of the V_(H), D_(H), and J_(H) gene segments. Hypervariable domain sequence diversity is further increased by independent addition and deletion of nucleotides at the V_(H)-D_(H), D_(H)-J_(H), and V_(H)-J_(H) junctions during the process of Ig gene rearrangement. Distinct from TCR, Ig sequence diversity is further augmented by somatic hypermutation (SHM) throughout the rearranged IG gene after a naïve B cell initially recognizes an antigen. The process of SHM is not restricted to CDR3, and therefore can introduce changes to the germline sequence in framework regions, CDR1 and CDR2, as well as in the somatically rearranged CDR3.

As the adaptive immune system functions in part by clonal expansion of cells expressing unique TCRs or BCRs, accurately measuring the changes in total abundance of each T cell or B cell clone is important to understanding the dynamics of an adaptive immune response. For instance, a healthy human has a few million unique rearranged TCRβ chains, each carried in hundreds to thousands of clonal T-cells, out of the roughly trillion T cells in a healthy individual. Utilizing advances in high-throughput sequencing, a new field of molecular immunology has recently emerged to profile the vast TCR and BCR repertoires. Compositions and methods for the sequencing of rearranged adaptive immune receptor gene sequences and for adaptive immune receptor clonotype determination are described in U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; and PCT/US2011/049012, all herein incorporated by reference.

To date, several different strategies have been employed to sequence nucleic acids encoding adaptive immune receptors quantitatively at high throughput, and these strategies may be distinguished, for example, by the approach that is used to amplify the CDR3-encoding regions, and by the choice of sequencing genomic DNA (gDNA) or messenger RNA (mRNA).

Sequencing mRNA is a potentially easier method than sequencing gDNA, because mRNA splicing events remove the intron between J and C segments. This allows for the amplification of adaptive immune receptors (e.g., TCRs or Igs) having different V regions and J regions using a common 3′ PCR primer in the C region. For each TCRβ, for example, the thirteen J segments are all less than 60 base pairs (bp) long. Therefore, splicing events bring identical polynucleotide sequences encoding TCRβ constant regions (regardless of which V and J sequences are used) within less than 100 bp of the rearranged VDJ junction. The spliced mRNA can then be reverse transcribed into complementary DNA (cDNA) using poly-dT primers complementary to the poly-A tail of the mRNA, random small primers (usually hexamers or nonamers) or C-segment-specific oligonucleotides. This should produce an unbiased library of TCR cDNA (because all cDNAs are primed with the same oligonucleotide, whether poly-dT, random hexamer, or C segment-specific oligo) that may then be sequenced to obtain information on the V and J segment used in each rearrangement, as well as the specific sequence of the CDR3. Such sequencing could use single, long reads spanning CDR3 (“long read”) technology, or could instead involve shotgun assembly of the longer sequences using fragmented libraries and higher throughput shorter sequence reads.

Efforts to quantify the number of cells in a sample that express a particular rearranged TCR (or Ig) based on mRNA sequencing are difficult to interpret, however, because each cell potentially expresses different quantities of TCR mRNA. For example, T cells activated in vitro have 10-100 times as much mRNA per cell than quiescent T cells. To date, there is very limited information on the relative amount of TCR mRNA in T cells of different functional states, and therefore quantitation of mRNA in bulk does not necessarily accurately measure the number of cells carrying each clonal TCR rearrangement.

Most T cells, on the other hand, have one productively rearranged TCRα and one productively rearranged TCRβ gene (or two rearranged TCRγ and TCRδ), and most B cells have one productively rearranged Ig heavy-chain gene and one productively rearranged Ig light-chain gene (either IGK or IGL) so quantification in a sample of genomic DNA encoding TCRs or BCRs should directly correlate with, respectively, the number of T or B cells in the sample. Genomic sequencing of polynucleotides encoding any one or more of the adaptive immune receptor chains desirably entails amplifying with equal efficiency all of the many possible rearranged CDR3 sequences that are present in a sample containing DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject, followed by quantitative sequencing, such that a quantitative measure of the relative abundance of each rearranged CDR3 clonotype can be obtained.

Difficulties are encountered with such approaches, however, in that equal amplification and sequencing efficiencies may not be achieved readily for each rearranged clone using multiplex PCR. For example, at TCRB each clone employs one of 54 possible germline V region-encoding genes and one of 13 possible J region-encoding genes. The DNA sequence of the V and J segments is necessarily diverse, in order to generate a diverse adaptive immune repertoire. This sequence diversity makes it impossible to design a single, universal primer sequence that will anneal to all V segments (or J segments) with equal affinity, and yields complex DNA samples in which accurate determination of the multiple distinct sequences contained therein is hindered by technical limitations on the ability to quantify a plurality of molecular species simultaneously using multiplexed amplification and high throughput sequencing.

One or more factors can give rise to artifacts that skew the correlation between sequencing data outputs and the number of copies of an input clonotype, compromising the ability to obtain reliable quantitative data from sequencing strategies that are based on multiplexed amplification of a highly diverse collection of TCRβ gene templates. These artifacts often result from unequal use of diverse primers during the multiplexed amplification step. Such biased utilization of one or more oligonucleotide primers in a multiplexed reaction that uses diverse amplification templates may arise as a function of differential annealing kinetics due to one or more of differences in the nucleotide base composition of templates and/or oligonucleotide primers, differences in template and/or primer length, the particular polymerase that is used, the amplification reaction temperatures (e.g., annealing, elongation and/or denaturation temperatures), and/or other factors (e.g., Kanagawa, 2003 J. Biosci. Bioeng. 96:317; Day et al., 1996 Hum. Mol. Genet. 5:2039; Ogino et al., 2002 J. Mol. Diagnost. 4:185; Barnard et al., 1998 Biotechniques 25:684; Aird et al., 2011 Genome Biol. 12:R18).

Clearly there remains a need for improved compositions and methods that will permit accurate quantification of adaptive immune receptor-encoding DNA sequence diversity in complex samples, in a manner that avoids skewed results such as misleading over- or underrepresentation of individual sequences due to biases in the amplification of specific templates in an oligonucleotide primer set used for multiplexed amplification of a complex template DNA population. The presently described embodiments address this need and provide other related advantages.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

A composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or more adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject, each adaptive immune receptor comprising a variable region and a joining region, the composition comprising a plurality of template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula: 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′ [I] wherein: (a) V is a polynucleotide comprising at least 20 and not more than 1000 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor variable (V) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and each V polynucleotide comprising a unique oligonucleotide sequence; (b) J is a polynucleotide comprising at least 15 and not more than 600 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor joining (J) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and each J polynucleotide comprising a unique oligonucleotide sequence; (c) U1 is either nothing or comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is selected from (i) a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) a first sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence; (d) U2 is either nothing or comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is selected from (i) a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a second sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence; (e) B1, B2, B3, and B4 are each independently either nothing or each comprises an oligonucleotide B that comprises a barcode sequence of 3-25 contiguous nucleotides, wherein each B1, B2, B3 and B4 comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies, as a paired combination, (i) the unique V oligonucleotide sequence of (a) and (ii) the unique J oligonucleotide sequence of (b); (f) R is either nothing or comprises a restriction enzyme recognition site that comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is absent from (a)-(e), and wherein: (g) the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least a or at least b unique oligonucleotide sequences, whichever is larger, wherein a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, and the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique V polynucleotide and at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique J polynucleotide.

In one embodiment, a is 1 to a number of maximum V gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject. In another embodiment, b is 1 to a number of maximum J gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject. In other embodiments, a is 1 or b is 1.

In some embodiments, the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least (a×b) unique oligonucleotide sequences, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the mammalian subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the mammalian subject, and the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide for every possible combination of a V region-encoding gene segment and a J region-encoding gene segment. In one embodiment, J comprises a constant region of the adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence.

In another embodiment, the adaptive immune receptor is selected from the group consisting of TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, and IGL. In some embodiments, the V polynucleotide of (a) encodes a TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, or IGL receptor V-region polypeptide. In other embodiments, the J polynucleotide of (b) encodes a TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, or IGL receptor J-region polypeptide.

In some embodiments, a stop codon is between V and B2.

In one embodiment, each template oligonucleotide in the plurality of template oligonucleotides is present in a substantially equimolar amount. In another embodiment, the plurality of template oligonucleotides have a plurality of sequences of general formula (I) that is selected from: (1) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which the V and J polynucleotides have the TCRB V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 68 TCRB V and J SEQ ID NOs. in FIGS. 5a-5l as TCRB V/J set 1, TCRB V/J set 2, TCRB V/J set 3, TCRB V/J set 4, TCRB V/J set 5, TCRB V/J set 6, TCRB V/J set 7, TCRB V/J set 8, TCRB V/J set 9, TCRB V/J set 10, TCRB V/J set 11, TCRB V/J set 12 and TCRB V/J set 13; (2) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which the V and J polynucleotides have the TCRG V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 14 TCRG V and J SEQ ID NOs. in FIGS. 6a and 6b as TCRG V/J set 1, TCRG V/J set 2, TCRG V/J set 3, TCRG V/J set 4 and TCRG V/J set 5; (3) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which the V and J polynucleotides have the IGH V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 127 IGH V and J SEQ ID NOs. in FIGS. 7a-7m as IGH V/J set 1, IGH V/J set 2, IGH V/J set 3, IGH V/J set 4, IGH V/J set 5, IGH V/J set 6, IGH V/J set 7, IGH V/J set 8 and IGH V/J set 9; (4) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS:3157-4014; (5) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS:4015-4084; (6) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS:4085-5200; (7) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS:5579-5821; (8) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS: 5822-6066; and (9) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) as set forth in SEQ ID NOS: 6067-6191.

In some embodiments, V is a polynucleotide comprising at least 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, 180, or 210 contiguous nucleotides of the adaptive immune receptor V region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof. In another embodiment, V is a polynucleotide comprising not more than 900, 800, 700, 600 or 500 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor V region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.

In other embodiments, J is a polynucleotide comprising at least 16-30, 31-60, 61-90, 91-120, or 120-150 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof. In another embodiment, J is a polynucleotide comprising not more than 500, 400, 300 or 200 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.

In some embodiments, each template oligonucleotide is less than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 400, 300 or 200 nucleotides in length.

In other embodiments, the composition includes a set of oligonucleotide primers that is capable of amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or more adaptive immune receptors comprising a plurality a′ of unique V-segment oligonucleotide primers and a plurality b′ of unique J-segment oligonucleotide primers. In some embodiments, a′ is 1 to a number of maximum V gene segments in the mammalian genome, and b′ is 1 to a number of maximum number of J gene segments in the mammalian genome. In one embodiment, a′ is a. In another embodiment, b′ is b.

In yet another embodiment, each V-segment oligonucleotide primer and each J-segment oligonucleotide primer in the oligonucleotide primer set is capable of specifically hybridizing to at least one template oligonucleotide in the plurality of template oligonucleotides. In other embodiments, each V-segment oligonucleotide primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segment. In another embodiment, each J-segment oligonucleotide primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segment.

In other embodiments, the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide having an oligonucleotide sequence of general formula (I) to which each V-segment oligonucleotide primer can specifically hybridize, and at least one template oligonucleotide having an oligonucleotide sequence of general formula (I) to which each J-segment oligonucleotide primer can specifically hybridize.

The invention comprises a method for determining non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of a set of oligonucleotide primers that is capable of amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or more adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject. The method includes steps for: (a) amplifying the composition as described herein in a multiplex PCR reaction to obtain a plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides; (b) sequencing said plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides to determine, for each unique template oligonucleotide comprising said plurality, (i) a template oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) a frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequence; and (c) comparing a frequency of occurrence of each of said template oligonucleotide sequences to an expected distribution, wherein said expected distribution is based on predetermined molar ratios of said plurality of template oligonucleotides comprising said composition, and wherein a deviation between said frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequences and said expected distribution indicates a non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers.

In one embodiment, the predetermined molar ratios are equimolar. In another embodiment, the expected distribution comprises a uniform amplification level for said set of template oligonucleotides amplified by said set of oligonucleotide primers. In yet another embodiment, each amplified template nucleic acid molecule is less than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 400, 300, 200, 100, 90, 80 or 70 nucleotides in length.

The method includes steps comprising for each member of the set of oligonucleotide primers that exhibits non-uniform amplification potential relative to the expected distribution, adjusting the relative representation of the oligonucleotide primer member in the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers. In one embodiment, adjusting comprises increasing the relative representation of the member in the set of oligonucleotide primers, thereby correcting non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide primers. In another embodiment, adjusting comprises decreasing the relative representation of the member in the set of oligonucleotide primers, thereby correcting non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide primers.

In other embodiments, the set of oligonucleotide primers does not include oligonucleotide primers that specifically hybridize to a V-region pseudogene or orphon or to a J-region pseudogene or orphon.

The method also includes steps comprising: for each member of the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers that exhibits non-uniform amplification potential relative to the expected distribution, calculating a proportionately increased or decreased frequency of occurrence of the amplified template nucleic acid molecules, the amplification of which is promoted by said member, thereby correcting for non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide primers.

The invention includes a method for quantifying a plurality of rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject, each adaptive immune receptor comprising a variable (V) region and a joining (J) region, the method comprising: (A) amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules in a multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) that comprises: (1) rearranged nucleic acid molecules from the biological sample that comprises lymphoid cells of the mammalian subject; (2) the composition as described herein wherein a known number of each of the plurality of template oligonucleotides having a unique oligonucleotide sequence is present; (3) an oligonucleotide amplification primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors from the biological sample.

In some embodiments, the primer set comprises: (a) in substantially equimolar amounts, a plurality of V-segment oligonucleotide primers that are each independently capable of specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor V-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each V-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segment and wherein the plurality of V-segment primers specifically hybridize to substantially all functional adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments that are present in the composition, and (b) in substantially equimolar amounts, a plurality of J-segment oligonucleotide primers that are each independently capable of specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor J-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each J-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segment and wherein the plurality of J-segment primers specifically hybridize to substantially all functional adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments that are present in the composition.

In another embodiment, the V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers are capable of promoting amplification in said multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of (i) substantially all template oligonucleotides in the composition to produce a multiplicity of amplified template oligonucleotides, said multiplicity of amplified template nucleic acid molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the template oligonucleotides in the composition, and (ii) substantially all rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding adaptive immune receptors in the biological sample to produce a multiplicity of amplified rearranged DNA molecules, said multiplicity of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the DNA from the biological sample.

In one embodiment, each amplified nucleic acid molecule in the plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides and in the plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules is less than 1000 nucleotides in length; (B) quantitatively sequencing said amplified template oligonucleotides and said amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules to quantify (i) a template product number of amplified template oligonucleotides which contain at least one oligonucleotide barcode sequence, and (ii) a rearranged product number of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules which lack an oligonucleotide barcode sequence; (C) calculating an amplification factor by dividing the template product number of (B)(i) by the known number of each of the plurality of template oligonucleotides having a unique oligonucleotide sequence of (A)(2); and (D) dividing the rearranged product number of (B)(ii) by the amplification factor calculated in (C) to quantify the number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the sample.

In other embodiments, the quantified number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the sample is the number of unique B cell or unique T cell genome templates in the sample.

The invention includes a method for calculating an average amplification factor in a multiplex PCR assay, comprising: obtaining a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject; contacting said sample with a known quantity of template oligonucleotides comprising a composition as described herein; amplifying the template oligonucleotides and the rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of the mammalian subject in a multiplex PCR reaction to obtain a plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides and a plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules; sequencing said plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides to determine, for each unique template oligonucleotide comprising said plurality, (i) a template oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) a frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequence; and determining an average amplification factor for said multiplex PCR reaction based on an average number of copies of said plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides and said known quantity of said template oligonucleotides.

The method also includes sequencing said plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of the mammalian subject to determine for each unique rearranged nucleic acid molecule comprising said plurality, i) a rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequence and (ii) a number of occurrences of said rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequence; and determining the number of lymphoid cells in said sample, based on the average amplification factor for said multiplex PCR reaction and said number of occurrences of said rearranged nucleic acid molecules.

In other embodiments, the method comprises determining the number of lymphoid cells in said sample comprises generating a sum of the number of occurrences of each of said amplified rearranged nucleic acid sequences and dividing said sum by said average amplification factor. In some embodiments, the known quantity is one copy each of said template oligonucleotides. In one embodiment, 100≦a≦500. In another embodiment, 100≦b≦500.

A method is provided for correcting for amplification bias in an multiplex PCR amplification reaction to quantify rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject, comprising: (a) contacting said sample with a composition described herein to generate a template-spiked sample, wherein said templates and said rearranged nucleic acid molecules comprise corresponding V and J region sequences; (b) amplifying said template-spiked sample in a multiplex PCR reaction to obtain a plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides and a plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding a plurality of adaptive immune receptors; (c) sequencing said plurality of amplified template oligonucleotides to determine, for each unique template oligonucleotide comprising said plurality, (i) a template oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) a frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequence; (d) sequencing said plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors, for each unique rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding said plurality of adaptive immune receptors comprising said plurality, (i) a rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequence and (ii) a frequency of occurrence of said rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequence; (e) comparing frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequences to an expected distribution, wherein said expected distribution is based on predetermined molar ratios of said plurality of template oligonucleotides comprising said composition, and wherein a deviation between said frequency of occurrence of said template oligonucleotide sequences and said expected distribution indicates non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers; (f) generating a set of correction values for a set of template molecules and rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequences amplified by said members of the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers having said indicated non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential, wherein said set of correction values corrects for amplification bias in said multiplex PCR reaction; and (g) optionally applying said set of correction values to said frequency of occurrence of said rearranged nucleic acid molecule sequences to correct for amplification bias in said multiplex PCR reaction.

The invention comprises a kit, comprising: reagents comprising: a composition comprising a plurality of template oligonucleotides and a set of oligonucleotide primers as described herein; instructions for determining a non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of the set of oligonucleotide primers that are capable of amplifying rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or more adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject.

In another embodiment, the kit comprises instructions for correcting for one or more members of the set of oligonucleotide primers having a non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential.

In other embodiments, the kit comprises instructions for quantifying the number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the sample

These and other aspects of the herein described invention embodiments will be evident upon reference to the following detailed description and attached drawings. All of the U.S. patents, U.S. patent application publications, U.S. patent applications, foreign patents, foreign patent applications and non-patent publications referred to in this specification and/or listed in the Application Data Sheet are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety, as if each was incorporated individually. Aspects and embodiments of the invention can be modified, if necessary, to employ concepts of the various patents, applications and publications to provide yet further embodiments.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

These and other features, aspects, and advantages of the present invention will become better understood with regard to the following description, and accompanying drawings, where:

FIG. 1 shows a schematic diagram of an exemplary template oligonucleotide for use in standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding an adaptive immune receptor (TCR or BCR). U1, U2, universal adaptor oligonucleotides; B1-4, barcode oligonucleotides; V, variable region oligonucleotide; J, joining region oligonucleotide; R, restriction enzyme recognition site; S, optional stop codon.

FIG. 2 shows post-amplification frequencies of individual TCRB V gene segment sequences amplified from a standardizing oligonucleotide template composition (an equimolar pool of the templates set forth in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560) using an equimolar (unadjusted) pool of 52 PCR primers (SEQ ID NOS:1753-1804) and quantitatively sequenced on the Illumina HiSeq™ DNA sequencer. Frequency in the absence of bias was calculated as 0.0188.

FIG. 3 shows the results of quantitative sequencing following cross-amplification of template oligonucleotides using TCRB V region-specific primers. Y-axis indicates individual amplification primers (SEQ ID NOS:1753-1804) that were present in each separate amplification reaction at twice the molar concentration (2×) of the other primers from the same primer set, for amplification of a standardizing oligonucleotide template composition (an equimolar pool of the templates set forth in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560); X-axis is not labeled but data points are presented in the same order as for Y-axis, with X-axis representing corresponding amplified V gene templates as identified by quantitative sequencing. Black squares indicate no change in degree of amplification with the respective primer present at 2× relative to equimolar concentrations of all other primers; white squares indicate 10-fold increase in amplification; grey squares indicate intermediate degrees (on a greyscale gradient) of amplification between zero and 10-fold. Diagonal line of white squares indicates that 2× concentration for a given primer resulted in about 10-fold increase in amplification of the respective template for most primers. Off-diagonal white squares indicate non-corresponding templates to which certain primers were able to anneal and amplify.

FIG. 4 shows post-amplification frequencies of individual TCRB V gene segment sequences amplified from a standardizing oligonucleotide template composition (an equimolar pool of the templates set forth in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560), using equimolar concentrations of all members of a TCRB amplification primer set (SEQ ID NOS:1753-1804) prior to adjusting for primer utilization bias (black bars, all V-region primers present in equimolar concentrations), and using the same primer set (SEQ ID NOS:1753-1804) after adjusting multiple individual primer concentrations to compensate for bias (grey bars, concentrations of highly efficient primers were reduced and concentrations of poorly efficient primers were increased, see Table 6). Post-amplification frequencies were determined by quantitative sequencing on the Illumina HiSeq™ DNA sequencer.

FIGS. 5a-5l show TCRB V/J sets (68 V+13 J) for use in template compositions that comprise a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′ [I], for use in standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of human T cell receptor p (TCRB) chain polypeptides.

FIGS. 6a and 6b show TCRG V/J sets (14 V+5 J) for use in template compositions that comprise a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′ [I], for use in standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of human T cell receptor γ (TCRG) chain polypeptides.

FIGS. 7a-7m show IGH V/J sets (127 V+9 J) for use in template compositions that comprise a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′ [I], for use in standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of human immunoglobulin heavy (IGH) chain polypeptides.

FIG. 8 shows the results of calculating an amplification factor for each VJ pair in a template composition that was added to a multiplexed PCR amplification of IGH sequences, and then averaging the amplification factor across all synthetic templates to estimate fold sequence coverage across all synthetic template molecules.

FIG. 9 shows a plot of the numbers of B cells that were estimated using a synthetic template composition and amplification factor as described herein, versus the known numbers of B cells used as a source of natural DNA templates.

FIG. 10 shows a pre-PCR amplification sequencing count for each of 1116 IGH VJ bias control molecules and 243 IGH DJ bias control molecules.

FIG. 11 shows TCRB-primer iterations for synthetic TCRB VJ templates graphed against relative amplification bias.

FIG. 12 shows IGH primer iterations for synthetic IGH VJ templates graphed against relative amplification bias.

FIG. 13 shows the relative amplification bias for 27 synthetic IGH DJ templates of the V gene.

FIGS. 14a-d show TCRG-primer iterations for 55 synthetic TCRG VJ templates. Relative amplification bias was determined for the TCRG VJ primers prior to chemical bias control correction (FIG. 14a ), 1st iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14b ), 2nd iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14c ), and final iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14d ).

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides, in certain embodiments and as described herein, compositions and methods that are useful for reliably quantifying large and structurally diverse populations of rearranged genes encoding adaptive immune receptors, such as immunoglobulins (Ig) and/or T cell receptors (TCR). These rearranged genes may be present in a biological sample containing DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject or biological source, including a human subject.

A “rearranged nucleic acid molecule,” as used herein, can include any genomic DNA, cDNA, or mRNA obtained directly or indirectly from a lymphoid cell line that includes sequences that encode a rearranged adaptive immune receptor.

Disclosed herein are unexpectedly advantageous approaches for the standardization and calibration of complex oligonucleotide primer sets that are used in multiplexed nucleic acid amplification reactions to generate a population of amplified rearranged DNA molecules from a biological sample containing rearranged genes encoding adaptive immune receptors, prior to quantitative high throughput sequencing of such amplified products. Multiplexed amplification and high throughput sequencing of rearranged TCR and BCR (IG) encoding DNA sequences are described, for example, in Robins et al., 2009 Blood 114, 4099; Robins et al., 2010 Sci. Translat. Med. 2:47ra64; Robins et al., 2011 J. Immunol. Meth. doi:10.1016/j.jim.2011.09. 001; Sherwood et al. 2011 Sci. Translat. Med. 3:90ra61; U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126 (US Pub. No. 2012/0058902), U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507 (US Pub. No. 2010/0330571), WO/2010/151416, WO/2011/106738 (PCT/US2011/026373), WO2012/027503 (PCT/US2011/049012), U.S. Ser. No. 61/550,311, and U.S. Ser. No. 61/569,118; accordingly these disclosures are incorporated by reference and may be adapted for use according to the embodiments described herein.

Briefly and according to non-limiting theory, the present compositions and methods overcome inaccuracies that may arise in current methods which quantify TCR and BCR gene diversity by sequencing the products of multiplexed nucleic acid amplification. To accommodate the vast diversity of TCR and BCR gene template sequences that may be present in a biological sample, oligonucleotide primer sets used in multiplexed amplification reactions typically comprise a wide variety of sequence lengths and nucleotide compositions (e.g., GC content). Consequently, under a given set of amplification reaction conditions, the efficiencies at which different primers anneal to and support amplification of their cognate template sequences may differ markedly, resulting in non-uniform utilization of different primers, which leads to artifactual biases in the relative quantitative representation of distinct amplification products.

For instance, relative overutilization of some highly efficient primers results in overrepresentation of certain amplification products, and relative underutilization of some other low-efficiency primers results in underrepresentation of certain other amplification products. Quantitative determination of the relative amount of each template species that is present in the lymphoid cell DNA-containing sample, which is achieved by sequencing the amplification products, may then yield misleading information with respect to the actual relative representation of distinct template species in the sample prior to amplification. In pilot studies, for example, it was observed that multiplexed PCR, using a set of oligonucleotide primers designed to be capable of amplifying a sequence of every possible human TCRB variable (V) region gene from human lymphoid cell DNA templates, did not uniformly amplify TCRB V gene segments. Instead, some V gene segments were relatively overamplified (representing ˜10% of total sequences) and other V gene segments were relatively underamplified (representing about 4×10⁻³% of total sequences); see also, e.g., FIG. 2.

To overcome the problem of such biased utilization of subpopulations of amplification primers, the present disclosure provides for the first time a template composition and method for standardizing the amplification efficiencies of the members of an oligonucleotide primer set, where the primer set is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of adaptive immune receptors (TCR or Ig) in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells. The template composition comprises a plurality of diverse template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) as described in greater detail herein:

5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′  (I)

The constituent template oligonucleotides, of which the template composition is comprised, are diverse with respect to the nucleotide sequences of the individual template oligonucleotides. The individual template oligonucleotides thus may vary in nucleotide sequence considerably from one another as a function of significant sequence variability amongst the large number of possible TCR or BCR variable (V) and joining (J) region polynucleotides. Sequences of individual template oligonucleotide species may also vary from one another as a function of sequence differences in U1, U2, B (B1, B2, B3, and B4) and R oligonucleotides that are included in a particular template within the diverse plurality of templates.

In certain embodiments barcode oligonucleotides B (B1, B2, B3, and B4) may independently and optionally comprise an oligonucleotide barcode sequence, wherein the barcode sequence is selected to identify uniquely a particular paired combination of a particular unique V oligonucleotide sequence and a particular unique J oligonucleotide sequence. The relative positioning of the barcode oligonucleotides B1 and B4 and universal adaptors advantageously permits rapid identification and quantification of the amplification products of a given unique template oligonucleotide by short sequence reads and paired-end sequencing on automated DNA sequencers (e.g., Illumina HiSeq™ or Illumina MiSEQ®, or GeneAnalyzer™-2, Illumina Corp., San Diego, Calif.). In particular, these and related embodiments permit rapid high-throughput determination of specific combinations of a V and a J sequence that are present in an amplification product, thereby to characterize the relative amplification efficiency of each V-specific primer and each J-specific primer that may be present in a primer set which is capable of amplifying rearranged TCR or BCR encoding DNA in a sample. Verification of the identities and/or quantities of the amplification products may be accomplished by longer sequence reads, optionally including sequence reads that extend to B2.

In use, each template oligonucleotide in the plurality of template oligonucleotides is present in a substantially equimolar amount, which in certain preferred embodiments includes preparations in which the molar concentrations of all oligonucleotides are within 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24 or 25 percent of each other. In certain other preferred embodiments as provided herein, template olignucleotides are regarded as being present in a substantially equimolar amount when the molar concentrations of all oligonucleotides are within one order of magnitude of each other, including preparations in which the greatest molar concentration that any given unique template oligonucleotide species may have is no more than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 440, 400, 350, 300, 250, 200, 150, 100, 90, 80, 70, 60, 50, 40 or 30 percent greater than the molar concentration at which is present the unique template oligonucleotide species having the lowest concentration in the composition.

In a similar manner, certain embodiments disclosed herein contemplate oligonucleotide primer sets for amplification, in which sets the component primers may be provided in substantially equimolar amounts. As also described herein, according to certain other embodiments, the concentration of one or more primers in a primer set may be adjusted deliberately so that certain primers are not present in equimolar amounts or in substantially equimolar amounts.

The template composition described herein may, in preferred embodiments, be employed as a nucleic acid amplification (e.g., PCR) template to characterize an oligonucleotide primer set, such as the complex sets of V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers that may be used in multiplexed amplification of rearranged TCR or Ig genes, for example, a primer set as provided herein or any of the primer sets described in Robins et al., 2009 Blood 114, 4099; Robins et al., 2010 Sci. Translat. Med. 2:47ra64; Robins et al., 2011 J. Immunol. Meth. doi:10.1016/j.jim.2011.09. 001; Sherwood et al. 2011 Sci. Translat. Med. 3:90ra61; U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126 (US Pub. No. 2012/0058902), U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507 (US Pub. No. 2010/0330571), WO/2010/151416, WO/2011/106738 (PCT/US2011/026373), WO2012/027503 (PCT/US2011/049012), U.S. Ser. No. 61/550,311, and U.S. Ser. No. 61/569,118; or the like.

Preferably all templates in the template composition for standardizing amplification efficiency, which is described herein and which comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides having diverse sequences and the general structure of general formula (I), are oligonucleotides of substantially identical length. Without wishing to be bound by theory, it is generally believed that in a nucleic acid amplification reaction such as a polymerase chain reaction (PCR), template DNA length can influence the amplification efficiency of oligonucleotide primers by affecting the kinetics of interactions between primers and template DNA molecules to which the primers anneal by specific, nucleotide sequence-directed hybridization through nucleotide base complementarity. Longer templates are generally regarded as operating less efficiently than relatively shorter templates. In certain embodiments, the presently disclosed template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of TCR or BCR comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) as provided herein, wherein the template oligonucleotides are of an identical length or a substantially identical length that is not more than 1000, 950, 900, 850, 800, 750, 700, 650, 600, 550, 500, 450, 400, 350, 300, 250, 200, 150 or 100 nucleotides in length, including all integer values therebetween.

Accordingly, in order to reduce, remove or minimize the potential contribution to undesirable biases in oligonucleotide primer utilization during multiplexed amplification, preferred embodiments disclosed herein may employ a plurality of template oligonucleotides wherein all template oligonucleotides in the sequence-diverse plurality of template oligonucleotides are of substantially identical length. A plurality of template oligonucleotides may be of substantially identical length when all (e.g., 100%) or most (e.g., greater than 50%) such oligonucleotides in a template composition are oligonucleotides that each have the exact same number of nucleotides, or where one or more template oligonucleotides in the template composition may vary in length from one another by no more than 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 or 100 nucleotides in length. It will be appreciated from the present disclosure that even in situations where not all template oligonucleotides have exactly the same length, the herein described compositions and methods may still be employed to determine and optionally correct non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of a set of oligonucleotide amplification primers.

According to certain presently disclosed embodiments, (i) each template oligonucleotide of the presently described template composition is provided in a substantially equimolar amount, (ii) the oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of adaptive immune receptor comprises a plurality of V-segment oligonucleotide primers that are provided in substantially equimolar amounts, (iii) the oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of adaptive immune receptor comprises a plurality of J-segment oligonucleotide primers that are provided in substantially equimolar amounts, and (iv) amplification scales linearly with the number of starting templates of a given sequence.

Hence, an expected yield for the amplification product of each template can be calculated and arbitrarily assigned a theoretical uniform amplification level value of 100%. After permitting the primer sets to amplify the sequences of the template oligonucleotides in an amplification reaction, any statistically significant deviation from substantial equivalence that is observed among the relative proportions of distinct amplification products indicates that there has been bias (i.e., unequal efficiency) in primer utilization during amplification. In other words, quantitative differences in the relative amounts of different amplification products that are obtained indicate that not all primers in the primer set have amplified their respective templates with comparable efficiencies. Certain embodiments contemplate assigning a range of tolerances above and below a theoretical 100% yield, such that any amplification level value within the range of tolerances may be regarded as substantial equivalence.

In certain such embodiments, the range of amplification product yields may be regarded as substantially equivalent when the product yields are all within the same order of magnitude (e.g., differ by less than a factor of ten). In certain other such embodiments, the range of amplification product yields may be regarded as substantially equivalent when the product yields differ from one another by no more than nine-fold, eight-fold, seven-fold, six-fold, five-fold, four-fold or three-fold. In certain other embodiments, product yields that may be regarded as being within an acceptable tolerance range may be more or less than a calculated 100% yield by as much as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 100, or 200%.

Because the method involves determining the nucleotide sequence of each amplification product using known techniques as part of the quantification process, the primer(s) responsible for amplification of each unique (as defined by sequence) product can be identified and their relative amount(s) in the primer set can be adjusted (e.g., increased or decreased in a statistically significant manner) accordingly. The concentrations of excessively efficient primers in the primer set can be reduced relative to the concentrations of other primers, so that the level of specific amplification by such primers of templates in the herein described template composition is substantially equivalent to the level of amplification delivered by the majority of primers which deliver the theoretical uniform amplification level, or which deliver a level that is within the acceptable tolerance range. The concentrations of poorly efficient primers in the primer set can be increased relative to the concentrations of other primers, so that the level of specific amplification by such primers of templates in the herein described template composition is substantially equivalent to the level of amplification delivered by the majority of primers which deliver the theoretical uniform amplification level, or which deliver a level within the acceptable tolerance range.

Accordingly and as described herein, there are thus presently provided a template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is designed to amplify coding sequences for a complete repertoire of a given TCR or Ig chain, a method for determining non-uniform amplification efficiency (“non-uniform amplification potential”) among members of such a primer set, and a method for correcting such non-uniform amplification potential. By providing the herein described template composition as a standard with which oligonucleotide primer sets can be calibrated, and in particular embodiments, where each template oligonucleotide is present in a substantially equimolar amount so that individual primer concentrations can be adjusted to yield substantially uniform amplification of a structurally diverse array of amplification products, the present disclosure thus advantageously overcomes the above described problems associated with biases in individual primer efficiency.

Using the compositions and methods provided herein, individual primers may be identified as having a non-uniform amplification potential by virtue of their promotion of non-uniform amplification as evidenced by increased (e.g., greater in a statistically significant manner) or decreased (e.g., lower in a statistically significant manner) amplification of specific template oligonucleotides relative to the uniform amplification level, despite the presence in an amplification reaction (i) of all template oligonucleotides in substantially equimolar amounts to one another, (ii) of all V-segment primers in substantially equimolar amounts to one another, and (iii) of all J-segment primers in substantially equimolar amounts to one another.

The relative concentrations of such primers may then be decreased or increased to obtain a modified complete set of primers in which all primers are not present in substantially equimolar amounts relative to one another, to compensate, respectively, for the increased or decreased level of amplification relative to the uniform amplification level. The primer set may then be retested for its ability to amplify all sequences in the herein disclosed template composition at the uniform amplification level, or within an acceptable tolerance range.

The process of testing modified primer sets for their ability to amplify the herein disclosed template composition, in which all template oligonucleotides are provided in substantially equimolar amounts to one another, may be repeated iteratively until all products are amplified at the uniform amplification level, or within an acceptable tolerance range. By such a process using the herein disclosed template composition, the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set may be standardized, where the primer set is capable of amplifying productively rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject.

Additionally or alternatively, according to the present disclosure it may be determined whether any particular pair of oligonucleotide amplification primers exhibits non-uniform amplification potential, such as increased or decreased amplification of the template composition relative to a uniform amplification level exhibited by a majority of the oligonucleotide amplification primers, and a normalizing adjustment factor can then be used to calculate, respectively, a proportionately decreased or increased frequency of occurrence of the amplification products that are promoted by each such amplification primer pair. The present template compositions thus, in certain embodiments, provide a method of correcting for non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of a set of oligonucleotide amplification primers.

Certain such embodiments may advantageously permit correction, calibration, standardization, normalization, or the like, of data that are obtained as a consequence of non-uniform amplification events. Thus, the present embodiments permit correction of data inaccuracies, such as may result from biased oligonucleotide primer utilization, without the need for iteratively adjusting the concentrations of one or more amplification primers and repeating the steps of amplifying the herein described template compositions. Advantageous efficiencies may thus be obtained where repetition of the steps of quantitatively sequencing the amplification products can be avoided. Certain other contemplated embodiments may, however, employ such an iterative approach.

Accordingly, and as described herein, there is presently provided a template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set, along with methods for using such a template composition to determine non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential (e.g., bias) among individual members of the oligonucleotide primer set. Also described herein are methods for correcting such non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potentials (e.g., biases) among members of the oligonucleotide primer set. These and related embodiments exploit previously unrecognized benefits that are obtained by calibrating complex oligonucleotide primer sets to compensate for undesirable amplification biases using the template composition for standardizing amplification efficiency having the features described herein, and will find uses in improving the accuracy with which specific clonotypic TCR and/or Ig encoding DNA sequences can be quantified, relative to previously described methodologies.

As also noted above and described elsewhere herein, prior to the present disclosure there existed unsatisfactory and difficult-to-discern discrepancies between (i) the actual quantitative distribution of rearranged adaptive immune receptor-encoding DNA templates having unique sequences in a biological sample comprising lymphoid cell DNA from a subject, and (ii) the relative representation of nucleic acid amplification products of such templates, following multiplexed amplification using a complex set of oligonucleotide amplification primers designed to amplify substantially all productively rearranged adaptive immune receptor genes in the sample. Due to, e.g., the heterogeneity of both the template population and the amplification primer set, and as shown herein, significant disparities in the amplification efficiencies of different amplification primers may be common, leading to substantial skewing in the relative proportions of amplification products that are obtained and quantitatively sequenced following an amplification reaction.

Templates And Primers

According to certain preferred embodiments there is thus provided a template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA (which in certain embodiments may refer to productively rearranged DNA but which in certain other embodiments need not be so limited) encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject, the template composition comprising a plurality of template oligonucleotides of general formula (I):

5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′  (I)

as provided herein. In certain preferred embodiments each template oligonucleotide in the plurality of template oligonucleotides is present in a substantially equimolar amount, which in certain embodiments and as noted above may refer to a composition in which each of the template oligonucleotides is present at an equimolar concentration or at a molar concentration that deviates from equimolar by no more than 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100 or 200% on a molar basis, and which in certain other embodiments may refer to a composition in which all of the template oligonucleotides are present at molar concentrations that are within an order of magnitude of one another. The plurality of templates may comprise at least 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900, 1000, 1100 or more discrete oligonucleotide species each having a distinct nucleotide sequence, including every intermediate integer value therebetween.

The herein disclosed template composition thus comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides of general formula:

5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′  [I]

wherein, briefly and as elaborated in greater detail elsewhere herein, according to certain preferred embodiments:

V is a polynucleotide comprising at least 20, 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, 180, or 210, and not more than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600 or 500 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor variable (V) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and in each of the plurality of template oligonucleotide sequences V comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence;

J is a polynucleotide comprising at least 15-30, 31-60, 61-90, 91-120, or 120-150, and not more than 600, 500, 400, 300 or 200 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor joining (J) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and in each of the plurality of template oligonucleotide sequences J comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence;

U1 and U2 are each either nothing or each comprise an oligonucleotide having, independently, a sequence that is selected from (i) a universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to the universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence;

B1, B2, B3, and B4 are each independently either nothing or each comprise an oligonucleotide B that comprises an oligonucleotide barcode sequence of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900 or 1000 contiguous nucleotides (including all integer values therebetween), wherein in each of the plurality of template oligonucleotide sequences B comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies, or identifies as a paired combination, (i) the unique V oligonucleotide sequence of the template oligonucleotide and (ii) the unique J oligonucleotide sequence of the template oligonucleotide; and

R is either nothing or comprises a restriction enzyme recognition site that comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is absent from V, J, U1, U2, B1, B2, B3, and B4.

In some embodiments, the template oligonucleotide composition comprises additional non-coding or random oligonucleotides. These oligonucleotides may be inserted in various sections between or within the components in the general formula I (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′) and be of various lengths in size.

In one embodiment, a is 1 to a number of maximum V gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject. In another embodiment, b is 1 to a number of maximum J gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject. In other embodiments, a is 1 or b is 1. In some embodiments, a can range from 1 V gene segment to 54 V gene segments for TCRA, 1-76 V gene segments for TCRB, 1-15 V gene segments for TCRG, 1-7 V gene segments for TCRD, 1-165 V gene segments for IGH, 1-111 for IGK, or 1-79 V gene segments for IGL. In other embodiments, b can range from 1 J gene segment to 61 J gene segments for TCRA, 1-14 J gene segments for TCRB, 1-5 J gene segments for TCRG, 1-4 gene segments for TCRD, 1-9 J gene segments for IGH, 1-5 J gene segments for IGK, or 1-11 J gene segments for IGL.

The table below lists the number of V gene segments (a) and J gene segments (b) for each human adaptive immune receptor loci, including functional V and J segments.

functional Functional V segments * V segments ** J segments * J segments ** TCRA 54 45 61 50 TCRB 76 48 14 13 TCRG 15 6 5 5 TCRD 7 7 4 4 IGH 165 51 9 6 IGK 111 44 5 5 IGL 79 33 11 7 * Total variable and joining segment genes ** Variable and joining segment genes with at least one functional allele

In some embodiments, the J polynucleotide comprises at least 15-30, 31-60, 61-90, 91-120, or 120-150, and not more than 600, 500, 400, 300 or 200 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor J constant region, or the complement thereof.

In certain embodiments the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least (a×b) unique oligonucleotide sequences, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in a subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, and the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide for every possible combination of a V region-encoding gene segment and a J region-encoding gene segment.

The presently contemplated invention is not intended to be so limited, however, such that in certain embodiments, a substantially fewer number of template oligonucleotides may advantageously be used. In these and related embodiments, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in a subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, the minimum number of unique oligonucleotide sequences of which the plurality of template oligonucleotides is comprised may be determined by whichever is the larger of a and b, so long as each unique V polynucleotide sequence and each unique J polynucleotide sequence is present in at least one template oligonucleotide in the template composition. Thus, according to certain related embodiments the template composition may comprise at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique V polynucleotide, e.g., that includes a single one of each unique V polynucleotide according to general formula (I), and at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique J polynucleotide, e.g., that includes a single one of each unique J polynucleotide according to general formula (I).

In certain other embodiments, the template composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide to which each oligonucleotide amplification primer in an amplification primer set can anneal.

That is, in certain embodiments, the template composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide having an oligonucleotide sequence of general formula (I) to which each V-segment oligonucleotide primer can specifically hybridize, and at least one template oligonucleotide having an oligonucleotide sequence of general formula (I) to which each J-segment oligonucleotide primer can specifically hybridize.

According to such embodiments the oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors comprises a plurality a′ of unique V-segment oligonucleotide primers and a plurality b′ of unique J-segment oligonucleotide primers. The plurality of a′ V-segment oligonucleotide primers are each independently capable of annealing or specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor V-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each V-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segment. The plurality of b′ J-segment oligonucleotide primers are each independently capable of annealing or specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor J-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each J-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segment.

In some embodiments, a′ is the same as a (described above for template oligonucleotides). In other embodiments, b′ is the same as b (described above for template oligonucleotides).

Thus, in certain embodiments and as also discussed elsewhere herein, the present template composition may be used in amplification reactions with amplification primers that are designed to amplify all rearranged adaptive immune receptor encoding gene sequences, including those that are not expressed, while in certain other embodiments the template composition and amplification primers may be designed so as not to yield amplification products of rearranged genes that are not expressed (e.g., pseudogenes, orphons). It will therefore be appreciated that in certain embodiments only a subset of rearranged adaptive immune receptor encoding genes may desirably be amplified, such that suitable amplification primer subsets may be designed and employed to amplify only those rearranged V-J sequences that are of interest. In these and related embodiments, correspondingly, a herein described template composition comprising only a subset of interest of rearranged V-J rearranged sequences may be used, so long as the template composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide to which each oligonucleotide amplification primer in an amplification primer set can anneal. The actual number of template oligonucleotides in the template composition may thus vary considerably among the contemplated embodiments, as a function of the amplification primer set that is to be used.

For example, in certain related embodiments, in the template composition the plurality of template oligonucleotides may have a plurality of sequences of general formula (I) that is selected from (1) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the TCRB V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 68 TCRB V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIGS. 5a-5l as TCRB V/J set 1, TCRB V/J set 2, TCRB V/J set 3, TCRB V/J set 4, TCRB V/J set 5, TCRB V/J set 6, TCRB V/J set 7, TCRB V/J set 8, TCRB V/J set 9, TCRB V/J set 10, TCRB V/J set 11, TCRB V/J set 12 and TCRB V/J set 13; (2) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the TCRG V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 14 TCRG V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIG. 6 as TCRG V/J set 1, TCRG V/J set 2, TCRG V/J set 3, TCRG V/J set 4 and TCRG V/J set 5; and (3) the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the IGH V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 127 IGH V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIG. 7 as IGH V/J set 1, IGH V/J set 2, IGH V/J set 3, IGH V/J set 4, IGH V/J set 5, IGH V/J set 6, IGH V/J set 7, IGH V/J set 8 and IGH V/J set 9.

In certain embodiments, V is a polynucleotide sequence that encodes at least 10-70 contiguous amino acids of an adaptive immune receptor V-region, or the complement thereof; J is a polynucleotide sequence that encodes at least 5-30 contiguous amino acids of an adaptive immune receptor J-region, or the complement thereof; U1 and U2 are each either nothing or comprise an oligonucleotide comprising a nucleotide sequence that is selected from (i) a universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to the universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence; B1, B2, B3 and B4 are each independently either nothing or each comprise an oligonucleotide B that comprises an oligonucleotide barcode sequence of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 contiguous nucleotides, wherein in each of the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences B comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies, as a paired combination, (i) the unique V oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) the unique J oligonucleotide sequence; and R is either nothing or comprises a restriction enzyme recognition site that comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is absent from V, J, U1, U2, B1, B2, B3, and B4. In certain preferred embodiments the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least either a or b unique oligonucleotide sequences, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, and the composition comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides that comprise at least whichever is the greater of a or b unique template oligonucleotide sequences, provided that at least one V polynucleotide corresponding to each V region-encoding gene segment and at least one J polynucleotide corresponding to each J region-encoding gene segment is included.

A large number of adaptive immune receptor variable (V) region and joining (J) region gene sequences are known as nucleotide and/or amino acid sequences, including non-rearranged genomic DNA sequences of TCR and Ig loci, and productively rearranged DNA sequences at such loci and their encoded products, and also including pseudogenes at these loci, and also including related orphons. See, e.g., U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; PCT/US2011/049012. These and other sequences known to the art may be used according to the present disclosure for the design and production of template oligonucleotides to be included in the presently provided template composition for standardizing amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set, and for the design and production of the oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding TCR or Ig polypeptide chains, which rearranged DNA may be present in a biological sample comprising lymphoid cell DNA.

In formula (I), V is a polynucleotide sequence of at least 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 110, 120, 130, 140, 150, 160, 170, 180, 190, 200, 210, 220, 230, 240, 250, 260, 270, 280, 290, 300, 310, 320, 330, 340, 350, 360, 370, 380, 390, 400 or 450 and not more than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600 or 500 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor (e.g., TCR or BCR) variable (V) region gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and in each of the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences V comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence. Genomic sequences for TCR and BCR V region genes of humans and other species are known and available from public databases such as Genbank; V region gene sequences include polynucleotide sequences that encode the products of expressed, rearranged TCR and BCR genes and also include polynucleotide sequences of pseudogenes that have been identified in the V region loci. The diverse V polynucleotide sequences that may be incorporated into the presently disclosed templates of general formula (I) may vary widely in length, in nucleotide composition (e.g., GC content), and in actual linear polynucleotide sequence, and are known, for example, to include “hot spots” or hypervariable regions that exhibit particular sequence diversity.

The polynucleotide V in general formula (I) (or its complement) includes sequences to which members of oligonucleotide primer sets specific for TCR or BCR genes can specifically anneal. Primer sets that are capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of TCR or BCR are described, for example, in U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; or PCT/US2011/049012; or the like; or as described therein may be designed to include oligonucleotide sequences that can specifically hybridize to each unique V gene and to each J gene in a particular TCR or BCR gene locus (e.g., TCR α, β, γ or δ, or IgH μ, γ, δ, α or ε, or IgL κ or λ). For example by way of illustration and not limitation, an oligonucleotide primer of an oligonucleotide primer amplification set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of TCR or BCR may typically include a nucleotide sequence of 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 or 40 contiguous nucleotides, or more, and may specifically anneal to a complementary sequence of 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 or 40 contiguous nucleotides of a V or a J polynucleotide as provided herein. In certain embodiments the primers may comprise at least 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 or 30 nucleotides, and in certain embodiment the primers may comprise sequences of no more than 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 or 40 contiguous nucleotides. Primers and primer annealing sites of other lengths are also expressly contemplated, as disclosed herein.

The entire polynucleotide sequence of each polynucleotide V in general formula (I) may, but need not, consist exclusively of contiguous nucleotides from each distinct V gene. For example and according to certain embodiments, in the template composition described herein, each polynucleotide V of formula (I) need only have at least a region comprising a unique V oligonucleotide sequence that is found in one V gene and to which a single V region primer in the primer set can specifically anneal. Thus, the V polynucleotide of formula (I) may comprise all or any prescribed portion (e.g., at least 15, 20, 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, 180 or 210 contiguous nucleotides, or any integer value therebetween) of a naturally occurring V gene sequence (including a V pseudogene sequence) so long as at least one unique V oligonucleotide sequence region (the primer annealing site) is included that is not included in any other template V polynucleotide.

It may be preferred in certain embodiments that the plurality of V polynucleotides that are present in the herein described template composition have lengths that simulate the overall lengths of known, naturally occurring V gene nucleotide sequences, even where the specific nucleotide sequences differ between the template V region and any naturally occurring V gene. The V region lengths in the herein described templates may differ from the lengths of naturally occurring V gene sequences by no more than 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 percent.

The V polynucleotide in formula (I) may thus, in certain embodiments, comprise a nucleotide sequence having a length that is the same or similar to that of the length of a typical V gene from its start codon to its CDR3 encoding region and may, but need not, include a nucleotide sequence that encodes the CDR3 region. CDR3 encoding nucleotide sequences and sequence lengths may vary considerably and have been characterized by several different numbering schemes (e.g., Lefranc, 1999 The Immunologist 7:132; Kabat et al., 1991 In: Sequences of Proteins of Immunological Interest, NIH Publication 91-3242; Chothia et al., 1987 J. Mol. Biol. 196:901; Chothia et al., 1989 Nature 342:877; Al-Lazikani et al., 1997 J. Mol. Biol. 273:927; see also, e.g., Rock et al., 1994 J. Exp. Med. 179:323; Saada et al., 2007 Immunol. Cell Biol. 85:323).

Briefly, the CDR3 region typically spans the polypeptide portion extending from a highly conserved cysteine residue (encoded by the trinucleotide codon TGY; Y=T or C) in the V segment to a highly conserved phenylalanine residue (encoded by TTY) in the J segment of TCRs, or to a highly conserved tryptophan (encoded by TGG) in IGH. More than 90% of natural, productive rearrangements in the TCRB locus have a CDR3 encoding length by this criterion of between 24 and 54 nucleotides, corresponding to between 9 and 17 encoded amino acids. The CDR3 lengths of the presently disclosed synthetic template oligonucleotides should, for any given TCR or BCR locus, fall within the same range as 95% of naturally occurring rearrangements. Thus, for example, in a herein described template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of TCRB polypeptides, the CDR3 encoding portion of the V polynucleotide may have a length of from 24 to 54 nucleotides, including every integer therebetween. The numbering schemes for CDR3 encoding regions described above denote the positions of the conserved cysteine, phenylalanine and tryptophan codons, and these numbering schemes may also be applied to pseudogenes in which one or more codons encoding these conserved amino acids may have been replaced with a codon encoding a different amino acid. For pseudogenes which do not use these conserved amino acids, the CDR3 length may be defined relative to the corresponding position at which the conserved residue would have been observed absent the substitution, according to one of the established CDR3 sequence position numbering schemes referenced above.

It may also be preferred, in certain embodiments, that the plurality of V polynucleotides that are present in the herein described template composition have nucleotide compositions (e.g., percentage of GC content) that simulate the overall nucleotide compositions of known, naturally occurring V gene sequences, even where the specific nucleotide sequences differ. Such template V region nucleotide compositions may differ from the nucleotide compositions of naturally occurring V gene sequences by no more than 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 percent. Optionally and according to certain embodiments, the V polynucleotide of the herein described template oligonucleotide includes a stop codon at or near the 3′ end of V in general formula (I).

In formula (I) J is a polynucleotide comprising at least 15-30, 31-60, 61-90, 91-120, or 120-150, and not more than 600, 500, 400, 300 or 200 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor joining (J) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and in each of the plurality of oligonucleotide sequences J comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence.

The polynucleotide J in general formula (I) (or its complement) includes sequences to which members of oligonucleotide primer sets specific for TCR or BCR genes can specifically anneal. Primer sets that are capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding a plurality of TCR or BCR are described, for example, in U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; or PCT/US2011/049012; or the like; or as described therein may be designed to include oligonucleotide sequences that can specifically hybridize to each unique V gene and to each unique J gene in a particular TCR or BCR gene locus (e.g., TCR α, β, γ or δ, or IgH μ, γ, δ, α or ε, or IgL κ or λ).

The entire polynucleotide sequence of each polynucleotide J in general formula (I) may, but need not, consist exclusively of contiguous nucleotides from each distinct J gene. For example and according to certain embodiments, in the template composition described herein, each polynucleotide J of formula (I) need only have at least a region comprising a unique J oligonucleotide sequence that is found in one J gene and to which a single V region primer in the primer set can specifically anneal. Thus, the V polynucleotide of formula (I) may comprise all or any prescribed portion (e.g., at least 15, 20, 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, 180 or 210 contiguous nucleotides, or any integer value therebetween) of a naturally occurring V gene sequence (including a V pseudogene sequence) so long as at least one unique V oligonucleotide sequence region (the primer annealing site) is included that is not included in any other template J polynucleotide.

It may be preferred in certain embodiments that the plurality of J polynucleotides that are present in the herein described template composition have lengths that simulate the overall lengths of known, naturally occurring J gene nucleotide sequences, even where the specific nucleotide sequences differ between the template J region and any naturally occurring J gene. The J region lengths in the herein described templates may differ from the lengths of naturally occurring J gene sequences by no more than 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 percent.

The J polynucleotide in formula (I) may thus, in certain embodiments, comprise a nucleotide sequence having a length that is the same or similar to that of the length of a typical naturally occurring J gene and may, but need not, include a nucleotide sequence that encodes the CDR3 region, as discussed above.

Genomic sequences for TCR and BCR J region genes of humans and other species are known and available from public databases such as Genbank; J region gene sequences include polynucleotide sequences that encode the products of expressed and unexpressed rearranged TCR and BCR genes. The diverse J polynucleotide sequences that may be incorporated into the presently disclosed templates of general formula (I) may vary widely in length, in nucleotide composition (e.g., GC content), and in actual linear polynucleotide sequence.

Alternatives to the V and J sequences described herein, for use in construction of the herein described template oligonucleotides and/or V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers, may be selected by a skilled person based on the present disclosure using knowledge in the art regarding published gene sequences for the V- and J-encoding regions of the genes for each TCR and Ig subunit. Reference Genbank entries for human adaptive immune receptor sequences include: TCRa: (TCRA/D): NC_000014.8 (chr14:22090057 . . . 23021075); TCRβ: (TCRB): NC_000007.13 (chr7:141998851 . . . 142510972); TCRγ: (TCRG): NC_000007.13 (chr7:38279625 . . . 38407656); immunoglobulin heavy chain, IgH (IGH): NC_000014.8 (chr14: 106032614 . . . 107288051); immunoglobulin light chain-kappa, IgLκ (IGK): NC_000002.11 (chr2: 89156874 . . . 90274235); and immunoglobulin light chain-lambda, IgLλ (IGL): NC_000022.10 (chr22: 22380474 . . . 23265085). Reference Genbank entries for mouse adaptive immune receptor loci sequences include: TCRβ: (TCRB): NC_000072.5 (chr6: 40841295 . . . 41508370), and immunoglobulin heavy chain, IgH (IGH): NC_000078.5 (chr12:114496979 . . . 117248165).

Template and primer design analyses and target site selection considerations can be performed, for example, using the OLIGO primer analysis software and/or the BLASTN 2.0.5 algorithm software (Altschul et al., Nucleic Acids Res. 1997, 25(17):3389-402), or other similar programs available in the art.

Accordingly, based on the present disclosure and in view of these known adaptive immune receptor gene sequences and oligonucleotide design methodologies, for inclusion in the instant template oligonucleotides those skilled in the art can design a plurality of V region-specific and J region-specific polynucleotide sequences that each independently contain oligonucleotide sequences that are unique to a given V and J gene, respectively. Similarly, from the present disclosure and in view of known adaptive immune receptor sequences, those skilled in the art can also design a primer set comprising a plurality of V region-specific and J region-specific oligonucleotide primers that are each independently capable of annealing to a specific sequence that is unique to a given V and J gene, respectively, whereby the plurality of primers is capable of amplifying substantially all V genes and substantially all J genes in a given adaptive immune receptor-encoding locus (e.g., a human TCR or IgH locus). Such primer sets permit generation, in multiplexed (e.g., using multiple forward and reverse primer pairs) PCR, of amplification products that have a first end that is encoded by a rearranged V region-encoding gene segment and a second end that is encoded by a J region-encoding gene segment.

Typically and in certain embodiments, such amplification products may include a CDR3-encoding sequence although the invention is not intended to be so limited and contemplates amplification products that do not include a CDR3-encoding sequence. The primers may be preferably designed to yield amplification products having sufficient portions of V and J sequences and/or of V-J barcode (B) sequences as described herein, such that by sequencing the products (amplicons), it is possible to identify on the basis of sequences that are unique to each gene segment (i) the particular V gene, and (ii) the particular J gene in the proximity of which the V gene underwent rearrangement to yield a functional adaptive immune receptor-encoding gene. Typically, and in preferred embodiments, the PCR amplification products will not be more than 600 base pairs in size, which according to non-limiting theory will exclude amplification products from non-rearranged adaptive immune receptor genes. In certain other preferred embodiments the amplification products will not be more than 500, 400, 300, 250, 200, 150, 125, 100, 90, 80, 70, 60, 50, 40, 30 or 20 base pairs in size, such as may advantageously provide rapid, high-throughput quantification of sequence-distinct amplicons by short sequence reads.

In certain preferred embodiments, the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least a or at least b unique oligonucleotide sequences, whichever is larger, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, and the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique V polynucleotide and at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique J polynucleotide. It will be appreciated that because the template oligonucleotides have a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I), which includes a V polynucleotide and which also includes a J polynucleotide, that the template composition may thus comprise fewer than (a×b) unique oligonucleotide sequences, but will comprise at least the larger of a or b unique oligonucleotide sequences. Accordingly, the composition may accommodate at least one occurrence of each unique V polynucleotide sequence and at least one occurrence of each unique J polynucleotide sequence, where in some instances the at least one occurrence of a particular unique V polynucleotide will be present in the same template oligonucleotide in which may be found the at least one occurrence of a particular unique J polynucleotide. Thus, for example, “at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique V polynucleotide and at least one template oligonucleotide for each unique J polynucleotide” may in certain instances refer to a single template oligonucleotide in which one unique V polynucleotide and one unique J polynucleotide are present.

As also disclosed elsewhere herein, in certain other preferred embodiments the template composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide to which each oligonucleotide amplification primer in an amplification primer set can anneal. Hence, the composition may comprise fewer than a or b unique sequences, for example, where an amplification primer set may not include a unique primer for every possible V and/or J sequence.

It will be noted that certain embodiments contemplate a template composition for standardizing the amplification efficiency of an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying productively rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject as provided herein, wherein the template composition comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′ (I) as described herein. According to these and related embodiments and as also described elsewhere herein, the set of oligonucleotide amplification primers that is capable of amplifying productively rearranged DNA may exclude any oligonucleotide primers that specifically hybridize to a V-region pseudogene or orphon or to a J-region pseudogene or orphon. Hence, in such embodiments the template composition will desirably exclude template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) in which unique V oligonucleotide sequences and/or unique J oligonucleotide sequences are sequences that are, respectively, unique to a V-region pseudogene or orphon or to a J-region pseudogene or orphon.

An exemplary TCRB template composition comprising 858 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:3157-4014. Another exemplary TCRB template composition comprising 871 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:1-871. Another exemplary TCRB template composition comprising 689 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560.

An exemplary TCRG template composition comprising 70 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:4015-4084. An exemplary TCRG template composition comprising 70 distinct template oligonucleotides is also disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630.

An exemplary IGH template composition comprising 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:4085-5200. An exemplary IGH template composition comprising 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides is also disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:1805-2920.

Also disclosed herein are exemplary sets of V and J polynucleotides for inclusion in the herein described template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I). For TCRB, the plurality of template oligonucleotides may have a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the TCRB V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 68 TCRB V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIG. 5 as TCRB V/J set 1, TCRB V/J set 2, TCRB V/J set 3, TCRB V/J set 4, TCRB V/J set 5, TCRB V/J set 6, TCRB V/J set 7, TCRB V/J set 8, TCRB V/J set 9, TCRB V/J set 10, TCRB V/J set 11, TCRB V/J set 12 and TCRB V/J set 13.

For TCRG, the plurality of template oligonucleotides may have a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the TCRG V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 14 TCRG V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIG. 6 as TCRG V/J set 1, TCRG V/J set 2, TCRG V/J set 3, TCRG V/J set 4 and TCRG V/J set 5.

For IGH, the plurality of template oligonucleotides may have a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I) in which polynucleotides V and J have the IGH V and J sequences set forth in at least one set of 127 IGH V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIG. 7 as IGH V/J set 1, IGH V/J set 2, IGH V/J set 3, IGH V/J set 4, IGH V/J set 5, IGH V/J set 6, IGH V/J set 7, IGH V/J set 8 and IGH V/J set 9.

Primers

According to the present disclosure, oligonucleotide primers are provided in an oligonucleotide primer set that comprises a plurality of V-segment primers and a plurality of J-segment primers, where the primer set is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises lymphoid cell DNA. Suitable primer sets are known in the art and disclosed herein, for example, the primer sets in U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; or PCT/US2011/049012; or the like; or those shown in Table 1. In certain embodiments the primer set is designed to include a plurality of V sequence-specific primers that includes, for each unique V region gene (including pseudogenes) in a sample, at least one primer that can specifically anneal to a unique V region sequence; and for each unique J region gene in the sample, at least one primer that can specifically anneal to a unique J region sequence.

Primer design may be achieved by routine methodologies in view of known TCR and BCR genomic sequences. Accordingly, the primer set is preferably capable of amplifying every possible V-J combination that may result from DNA rearrangements in the TCR or BCR locus. As also described below, certain embodiments contemplate primer sets in which one or more V primers may be capable of specifically annealing to a “unique” sequence that may be shared by two or more V regions but that is not common to all V regions, and/or in which in which one or more J primers may be capable of specifically annealing to a “unique” sequence that may be shared by two or more J regions but that is not common to all J regions.

In particular embodiments, oligonucleotide primers for use in the compositions and methods described herein may comprise or consist of a nucleic acid of at least about 15 nucleotides long that has the same sequence as, or is complementary to, a 15 nucleotide long contiguous sequence of the target V- or J-segment (i.e., portion of genomic polynucleotide encoding a V-region or J-region polypeptide). Longer primers, e.g., those of about 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 45, or 50, nucleotides long that have the same sequence as, or sequence complementary to, a contiguous sequence of the target V- or J-region encoding polynucleotide segment, will also be of use in certain embodiments. All intermediate lengths of the presently described oligonucleotide primers are contemplated for use herein. As would be recognized by the skilled person, the primers may have additional sequence added (e.g., nucleotides that may not be the same as or complementary to the target V- or J-region encoding polynucleotide segment), such as restriction enzyme recognition sites, adaptor sequences for sequencing, bar code sequences, and the like (see e.g., primer sequences provided in the Tables and sequence listing herein). Therefore, the length of the primers may be longer, such as about 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 80, 85, 90, 95, 100 or more nucleotides in length or more, depending on the specific use or need.

Also contemplated for use in certain embodiments are adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer variants that may share a high degree of sequence identity to the oligonucleotide primers for which nucleotide sequences are presented herein, including those set forth in the Sequence Listing. Thus, in these and related embodiments, adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer variants may have substantial identity to the adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer sequences disclosed herein, for example, such oligonucleotide primer variants may comprise at least 70% sequence identity, preferably at least 75%, 80%, 85%, 90%, 91%, 92%, 93%, 94%, 95%, 96%, 97%, 98%, or 99% or higher sequence identity compared to a reference polynucleotide sequence such as the oligonucleotide primer sequences disclosed herein, using the methods described herein (e.g., BLAST analysis using standard parameters). One skilled in this art will recognize that these values can be appropriately adjusted to determine corresponding ability of an oligonucleotide primer variant to anneal to an adaptive immune receptor segment-encoding polynucleotide by taking into account codon degeneracy, reading frame positioning and the like.

Typically, oligonucleotide primer variants will contain one or more substitutions, additions, deletions and/or insertions, preferably such that the annealing ability of the variant oligonucleotide is not substantially diminished relative to that of an adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer sequence that is specifically set forth herein.

Table 1 presents as a non-limiting example an oligonucleotide primer set that is capable of amplifying productively rearranged DNA encoding TCR β-chains (TCRB) in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject. In this primer set the J segment primers share substantial sequence homology, and therefore may cross-prime amongst more than one target J polynucleotide sequence, but the V segment primers are designed to anneal specifically to target sequences within the CDR2 region of V and are therefore unique to each V segment. An exception, however, is present in the case of several V primers where the within-family sequences of the closely related target genes are identical (e.g., V6-2 and V6-3 are identical at the nucleotide level throughout the coding sequence of the V segment, and therefore may have a single primer, TRB2V6-2/3).

It will therefore be appreciated that in certain embodiments the number of different template oligonucleotides in the template composition, and/or the number of different oligonucleotide primers in the primer set, may be advantageously reduced by designing template and/or primers to exploit certain known similarities in V and/or J sequences. Thus, in these and related embodiments, “unique” oligonucleotide sequences as described herein may include specific V polynucleotide sequences that are shared by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 distinct template oligonucleotides and/or specific J polynucleotide sequences that are shared by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 or 13 distinct template oligonucleotides, where such templates differ in sequence from one another by other than the shared V and/or J sequences.

According to certain presently contemplated embodiments, it may be useful to decrease (e.g., reduce in a statistically significant manner) template amplification bias such as non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential among members of a set of amplification primers that can result from unequal primer efficiencies (e.g., unequal primer utilization) only for a limited subset of all naturally occurring V and J genes. For example, in analyses of the TCR or BCR immune repertoire involved in an immune response, whether to a specific antigen, as in a vaccine, or to a tissue, as in an autoimmune disease, only the productive TCR or IG rearrangements may be of interest. In such circumstances, it may be economically advantageous to identify and correct non-uniform nucleic acid amplification potential only for those V and J segment primers that contribute to productive rearrangements of TCR or BCR encoding DNA, and to exclude efforts to correct non-uniform amplification of pseudogenes and orphons (i.e., TCR or BCR V region-encoding segments that have been duplicated onto other chromosomes).

In the human IGH locus, for instance, the ImmunoGeneTics (IMGT) database (M.-P. LeFranc, Université Montpellier, Montpellier, France; www.imgt.org) annotates 165 V segment genes, of which 26 are orphons on other chromosomes and 139 are in the IGH locus at chromosome 14. Among the 139 V segments within the IGH locus, 51 have at least one functional allele, while 6 are ORFs (open-reading frames) which are missing at least one highly conserved amino-acid residue, and 81 are pseudogenes. Pseudogenes may include V segments that contain an in-frame stop codon within the V-segment coding sequence, a frameshift between the start codon and the CDR3 encoding sequence, one or more repeat-element insertions, and deletions of critical regions, such as the first exon or the RSS. To characterize functional IGH rearrangements in a sample while avoiding the time and expense of characterizing pseudogenes and/or orphons, it is therefore contemplated to use a subset of the herein described synthetic template oligonucleotides which is designed to include only those V segments that participate in a functional rearrangement to encode a TCR or BCR, without having to synthesize or calibrate amplification primers and template oligonucleotides specific to the pseudogene sequences. Advantageous efficiencies with respect, inter alia, to time and expense are thus obtained.

TABLE 1 Exemplary Oligonucleotide Primer Set (hsTCRB PCR Primers) SEQ ID Name Sequence NO: TRBJ1-1 TTACCTACAACTGTGAGTCTGGTGCCTTGTCCAAA 1631 TRBJ1-2 ACCTACAACGGTTAACCTGGTCCCCGAACCGAA 1632 TRBJ1-3 ACCTACAACAGTGAGCCAACTTCCCTCTCCAAA 1633 TRBJ1-4 CCAAGACAGAGAGCTGGGTTCCACTGCCAAA 1634 TRBJ1-5 ACCTAGGATGGAGAGTCGAGTCCCATCACCAAA 1635 TRBJ1-6 CTGTCACAGTGAGCCTGGTCCCGTTCCCAAA 1636 TRBJ2-1 CGGTGAGCCGTGTCCCTGGCCCGAA 1637 TRBJ2-2 CCAGTACGGTCAGCCTAGAGCCTTCTCCAAA 1638 TRBJ2-3 ACTGTCAGCCGGGTGCCTGGGCCAAA 1639 TRBJ2-4 AGAGCCGGGTCCCGGCGCCGAA 1640 TRBJ2-5 GGAGCCGCGTGCCTGGCCCGAA 1641 TRBJ2-6 GTCAGCCTGCTGCCGGCCCCGAA 1642 TRBJ2-7 GTGAGCCTGGTGCCCGGCCCGAA 1643 TRB2V10-1 AACAAAGGAGAAGTCTCAGATGGCTACAG 1644 TRB2V10-2 GATAAAGGAGAAGTCCCCGATGGCTATGT 1645 TRB2V10-3 GACAAAGGAGAAGTCTCAGATGGCTATAG 1646 TRB2V6-2/3 GCCAAAGGAGAGGTCCCTGATGGCTACAA 1647 TRB2V6-8 CTCTAGATTAAACACAGAGGATTTCCCAC 1648 TRB2V6-9 AAGGAGAAGTCCCCGATGGCTACAATGTA 1649 TRB2V6-5 AAGGAGAAGTCCCCAATGGCTACAATGTC 1650 TRB2V6-6 GACAAAGGAGAAGTCCCGAATGGCTACAAC 1651 TRB2V6-7 GTTCCCAATGGCTACAATGTCTCCAGATC 1652 TRB2V6-1 GTCCCCAATGGCTACAATGTCTCCAGATT 1653 TRB2V6-4 GTCCCTGATGGTTATAGTGTCTCCAGAGC 1654 TRB2V24-1 ATCTCTGATGGATACAGTGTCTCTCGACA 1655 TRB2V25-1 TTTCCTCTGAGTCAACAGTCTCCAGAATA 1656 TRB2V27 TCCTGAAGGGTACAAAGTCTCTCGAAAAG 1657 TRB2V26 CTCTGAGAGGTATCATGTTTCTTGAAATA 1658 TRB2V28 TCCTGAGGGGTACAGTGTCTCTAGAGAGA 1659 TRB2V19 TATAGCTGAAGGGTACAGCGTCTCTCGGG 1660 TRB2V4-1 CTGAATGCCCCAACAGCTCTCTCTTAAAC 1661 TRB2V4-2/3 CTGAATGCCCCAACAGCTCTCACTTATTC 1662 TRB2V2P CCTGAATGCCCTGACAGCTCTCGCTTATA 1663 TRB2V3-1 CCTAAATCTCCAGACAAAGCTCACTTAAA 1664 TRB2V3-2 CTCACCTGACTCTCCAGACAAAGCTCAT 1665 TRB2V16 TTCAGCTAAGTGCCTCCCAAATTCACCCT 1666 TRB2V23-1 GATTCTCATCTCAATGCCCCAAGAACGC 1667 TRB2V18 ATTTTCTGCTGAATTTCCCAAAGAGGGCC 1668 TRB2V17 ATTCACAGCTGAAAGACCTAACGGAACGT 1669 TRB2V14 TCTTAGCTGAAAGGACTGGAGGGACGTAT 1670 TRB2V2 TTCGATGATCAATTCTCAGTTGAAAGGCC 1671 TRB2V12-1 TTGATTCTCAGCACAGATGCCTGATGT 1672 TRB2V12-2 GCGATTCTCAGCTGAGAGGCCTGATGG 1673 TRB2V12-3/4 TCGATICICAGCTAAGATGCCIAATGC 1674 TRB2V12-5 TTCTCAGCAGAGATGCCTGATGCAACTTTA 1675 TRB2V7-9 GGTTCTCTGCAGAGAGGCCTAAGGGATCT 1676 TRB2V7-8 GCTGCCCAGTGATCGCTTCTTTGCAGAAA 1677 TRB2V7-4 GGCGGCCCAGTGGTCGGTTCTCTGCAGAG 1678 TRB2V7-6/7 ATGATCGGTTCTCTGCAGAGAGGCCTGAGG 1679 TRB2V7-2 AGTGATCGCTTCTCTGCAGAGAGGACTGG 1680 TRB2V7-3 GGCTGCCCAACGATCGGTTCTTTGCAGT 1681 TRB2V7-1 TCCCCGTGATCGGTTCTCTGCACAGAGGT 1682 TRB2V11- CTAAGGATCGATTTTCTGCAGAGAGGCTC 1683 123 TRB2V13 CTGATCGATTCTCAGCTCAACAGTTCAGT 1684 TRB2V5-1 TGGTCGATTCTCAGGGCGCCAGTTCTCTA 1685 TRB2V5-3 TAATCGATTCTCAGGGCGCCAGTTCCATG 1686 TRB2V5-4 TCCTAGATTCTCAGGTCTCCAGTTCCCTA 1687 TRB2V5-8 GGAAACTTCCCTCCTAGATTTTCAGGTCG 1688 TRB2V5-5 AAGAGGAAACTTCCCTGATCGATTCTCAGC 1689 TRB2V5-6 GGCAACTTCCCTGATCGATTCTCAGGTCA 1690 TRB2V9 GTTCCCTGACTTGCACTCTGAACTAAAC 1691 TRB2V15 GCCGAACACTTCTTTCTGCTTTCTTGAC 1692 TRB2V30 GACCCCAGGACCGGCAGTTCATCCTGAGT 1693 TRB2V20-1 ATGCAAGCCTGACCTTGTCCACTCTGACA 1694 TRB2V29-1 CATCAGCCGCCCAAACCTAACATTCTCAA 1695

In certain embodiments, the V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers as described herein are designed to include nucleotide sequences such that adequate information is present within the sequence of an amplification product of a rearranged adaptive immune receptor (TCR or Ig) gene to identify uniquely both the specific V and the specific J genes that give rise to the amplification product in the rearranged adaptive immune receptor locus (e.g., at least 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 base pairs of sequence upstream of the V gene recombination signal sequence (RSS), preferably at least about 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 or 40 base pairs of sequence upstream of the V gene recombination signal sequence (RSS), and in certain preferred embodiments greater than 40 base pairs of sequence upstream of the V gene recombination signal sequence (RSS), and at least 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 or 20 base pairs downstream of the J gene RSS, preferably at least about 22, 24, 26, 28 or 30 base pairs downstream of the J gene RSS, and in certain preferred embodiments greater than 30 base pairs downstream of the J gene RSS).

This feature stands in contrast to oligonucleotide primers described in the art for amplification of TCR-encoding or Ig-encoding gene sequences, which rely primarily on the amplification reaction merely for detection of presence or absence of products of appropriate sizes for V and J segments (e.g., the presence in PCR reaction products of an amplicon of a particular size indicates presence of a V or J segment but fails to provide the sequence of the amplified PCR product and hence fails to confirm its identity, such as the common practice of spectratyping).

Oligonucleotides (e.g., primers) can be prepared by any suitable method, including direct chemical synthesis by a method such as the phosphotriester method of Narang et al., 1979, Meth. Enzymol. 68:90-99; the phosphodiester method of Brown et al., 1979, Meth. Enzymol. 68:109-151; the diethylphosphoramidite method of Beaucage et al., 1981, Tetrahedron Lett. 22:1859-1862; and the solid support method of U.S. Pat. No. 4,458,066, each incorporated herein by reference. A review of synthesis methods of conjugates of oligonucleotides and modified nucleotides is provided in Goodchild, 1990, Bioconjugate Chemistry 1(3): 165-187, incorporated herein by reference.

The term “primer,” as used herein, refers to an oligonucleotide capable of acting as a point of initiation of DNA synthesis under suitable conditions. Such conditions include those in which synthesis of a primer extension product complementary to a nucleic acid strand is induced in the presence of four different nucleoside triphosphates and an agent for extension (e.g., a DNA polymerase or reverse transcriptase) in an appropriate buffer and at a suitable temperature.

A primer is preferably a single-stranded DNA. The appropriate length of a primer depends on the intended use of the primer but typically ranges from 6 to 50 nucleotides, or in certain embodiments, from 15-35 nucleotides. Short primer molecules generally require cooler temperatures to form sufficiently stable hybrid complexes with the template. A primer need not reflect the exact sequence of the template nucleic acid, but must be sufficiently complementary to hybridize with the template. The design of suitable primers for the amplification of a given target sequence is well known in the art and described in the literature cited herein.

As described herein, primers can incorporate additional features which allow for the detection or immobilization of the primer but do not alter the basic property of the primer, that of acting as a point of initiation of DNA synthesis. For example, primers may contain an additional nucleic acid sequence at the 5′ end which does not hybridize to the target nucleic acid, but which facilitates cloning, detection, or sequencing of the amplified product. The region of the primer which is sufficiently complementary to the template to hybridize is referred to herein as the hybridizing region.

As used herein, a primer is “specific,” for a target sequence if, when used in an amplification reaction under sufficiently stringent conditions, the primer hybridizes primarily to the target nucleic acid. Typically, a primer is specific for a target sequence if the primer-target duplex stability is greater than the stability of a duplex formed between the primer and any other sequence found in the sample. One of skill in the art will recognize that various factors, such as salt conditions as well as base composition of the primer and the location of the mismatches, will affect the specificity of the primer, and that routine experimental confirmation of the primer specificity will be needed in many cases. Hybridization conditions can be chosen under which the primer can form stable duplexes only with a target sequence. Thus, the use of target-specific primers under suitably stringent amplification conditions enables the selective amplification of those target sequences which contain the target primer binding sites.

In particular embodiments, primers for use in the methods described herein comprise or consist of a nucleic acid of at least about 15 nucleotides long that has the same sequence as, or is complementary to, a 15 nucleotide long contiguous sequence of the target V or J segment. Longer primers, e.g., those of about 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 45, or 50, nucleotides long that have the same sequence as, or sequence complementary to, a contiguous sequence of the target V or J segment, will also be of use in certain embodiments. All intermediate lengths of the aforementioned primers are contemplated for use herein. As would be recognized by the skilled person, the primers may have additional sequence added (e.g., nucleotides that may not be the same as or complementary to the target V or J segment), such as restriction enzyme recognition sites, adaptor sequences for sequencing, bar code sequences, and the like (see e.g., primer sequences provided herein and in the sequence listing). Therefore, the length of the primers may be longer, such as 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 65, 70, 75, nucleotides in length or more, depending on the specific use or need. For example, in one embodiment, the forward and reverse primers are both modified at the 5′ end with the universal forward primer sequence compatible with a DNA sequencer.

Also contemplated for use in certain embodiments are adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer variants that may share a high degree of sequence identity to the oligonucleotide primers for which nucleotide sequences are presented herein, including those set forth in the Sequence Listing. Thus, in these and related embodiments, adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer variants may have substantial identity to the adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer sequences disclosed herein, for example, such oligonucleotide primer variants may comprise at least 70% sequence identity, preferably at least 75%, 80%, 85%, 90%, 91%, 92%, 93%, 94%, 95%, 96%, 97%, 98%, or 99% or higher sequence identity compared to a reference polynucleotide sequence such as the oligonucleotide primer sequences disclosed herein, using the methods described herein (e.g., BLAST analysis using standard parameters). One skilled in this art will recognize that these values can be appropriately adjusted to determine corresponding ability of an oligonucleotide primer variant to anneal to an adaptive immune receptor segment-encoding polynucleotide by taking into account codon degeneracy, reading frame positioning and the like.

Typically, oligonucleotide primer variants will contain one or more substitutions, additions, deletions and/or insertions, preferably such that the annealing ability of the variant oligonucleotide is not substantially diminished relative to that of an adaptive immune receptor V-segment or J-segment oligonucleotide primer sequence that is specifically set forth herein. As also noted elsewhere herein, in preferred embodiments adaptive immune receptor V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers are designed to be capable of amplifying a rearranged TCR or IGH sequence that includes the coding region for CDR3.

According to certain embodiments contemplated herein, the primers for use in the multiplex PCR methods of the present disclosure may be functionally blocked to prevent non-specific priming of non-T or B cell sequences. For example, the primers may be blocked with chemical modifications as described in U.S. patent application publication US2010/0167353. According to certain herein disclosed embodiments, the use of such blocked primers in the present multiplex PCR reactions involves primers that may have an inactive configuration wherein DNA replication (i.e., primer extension) is blocked, and an activated configuration wherein DNA replication proceeds. The inactive configuration of the primer is present when the primer is either single-stranded, or when the primer is specifically hybridized to the target DNA sequence of interest but primer extension remains blocked by a chemical moiety that is linked at or near to the 3′ end of the primer.

The activated configuration of the primer is present when the primer is hybridized to the target nucleic acid sequence of interest and is subsequently acted upon by RNase H or another cleaving agent to remove the 3′ blocking group, thereby allowing an enzyme (e.g., a DNA polymerase) to catalyze primer extension in an amplification reaction. Without wishing to be bound by theory, it is believed that the kinetics of the hybridization of such primers are akin to a second order reaction, and are therefore a function of the T cell or B cell gene sequence concentration in the mixture. Blocked primers minimize non-specific reactions by requiring hybridization to the target followed by cleavage before primer extension can proceed. If a primer hybridizes incorrectly to a sequence that is related to the desired target sequence but which differs by having one or more non-complementary nucleotides that result in base-pairing mismatches, cleavage of the primer is inhibited, especially when there is a mismatch that lies at or near the cleavage site. This strategy to improve the fidelity of amplification reduces the frequency of false priming at such locations, and thereby increases the specificity of the reaction. As would be recognized by the skilled person, reaction conditions, particularly the concentration of RNase H and the time allowed for hybridization and extension in each cycle, can be optimized to maximize the difference in cleavage efficiencies between highly efficient cleavage of the primer when it is correctly hybridized to its true target sequence, and poor cleavage of the primer when there is a mismatch between the primer and the template sequence to which it may be incompletely annealed.

As described in US2010/0167353, a number of blocking groups are known in the art that can be placed at or near the 3′ end of the oligonucleotide (e.g., a primer) to prevent extension. A primer or other oligonucleotide may be modified at the 3′-terminal nucleotide to prevent or inhibit initiation of DNA synthesis by, for example, the addition of a 3′ deoxyribonucleotide residue (e.g., cordycepin), a 2′,3′-dideoxyribonucleotide residue, non-nucleotide linkages or alkane-diol modifications (U.S. Pat. No. 5,554,516). Alkane diol modifications which can be used to inhibit or block primer extension have also been described by Wilk et al., (1990 Nucleic Acids Res. 18 (8):2065), and by Arnold et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 6,031,091). Additional examples of suitable blocking groups include 3′ hydroxyl substitutions (e.g., 3′-phosphate, 3′-triphosphate or 3′-phosphate diesters with alcohols such as 3-hydroxypropyl), 2′3′-cyclic phosphate, 2′ hydroxyl substitutions of a terminal RNA base (e.g., phosphate or sterically bulky groups such as triisopropyl silyl (TIPS) or tert-butyl dimethyl silyl (TBDMS)). 2′-alkyl silyl groups such as TIPS and TBDMS substituted at the 3′-end of an oligonucleotide are described by Laikhter et al., U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/686,894, which is incorporated herein by reference. Bulky substituents can also be incorporated on the base of the 3′-terminal residue of the oligonucleotide to block primer extension.

In certain embodiments, the oligonucleotide may comprise a cleavage domain that is located upstream (e.g., 5′ to) of the blocking group used to inhibit primer extension. As examples, the cleavage domain may be an RNase H cleavage domain, or the cleavage domain may be an RNase H2 cleavage domain comprising a single RNA residue, or the oligonucleotide may comprise replacement of the RNA base with one or more alternative nucleosides. Additional illustrative cleavage domains are described in US2010/0167353.

Thus, a multiplex PCR system may use 40, 45, 50, 55, 60, 65, 70, 75, 80, 85, or more forward primers, wherein each forward primer is complementary to a single functional TCR or Ig V segment or a small family of functional TCR or Ig V segments, e.g., a TCR VI3 segment, (see e.g., the TCRBV primers as shown in Table 1, SEQ ID NOS:1644-1695), and, for example, thirteen reverse primers, each specific to a TCR or Ig J segment, such as TCR JI3 segment (see e.g., TCRBJ primers in Table 1, SEQ ID NOS:1631-1643). In another embodiment, a multiplex PCR reaction may use four forward primers each specific to one or more functional TCRγ V segment and four reverse primers each specific for one or more TCRγ J segments. In another embodiment, a multiplex PCR reaction may use 84 forward primers each specific to one or more functional V segments and six reverse primers each specific for one or more J segments.

Thermal cycling conditions may follow methods of those skilled in the art. For example, using a PCR Express™ thermal cycler (Hybaid, Ashford, UK), the following cycling conditions may be used: 1 cycle at 95° C. for 15 minutes, 25 to 40 cycles at 94° C. for 30 seconds, 59° C. for 30 seconds and 72° C. for 1 minute, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 10 minutes. As will be recognized by the skilled person, thermal cycling conditions may be optimized, for example, by modifying annealing temperatures, annealing times, number of cycles and extension times. As would be recognized by the skilled person, the amount of primer and other PCR reagents used, as well as PCR parameters (e.g., annealing temperature, extension times and cycle numbers), may be optimized to achieve desired PCR amplification efficiency.

Alternatively, in certain related embodiments also contemplated herein, “digital PCR” methods can be used to quantitate the number of target genomes in a sample, without the need for a standard curve. In digital PCR, the PCR reaction for a single sample is performed in a multitude of more than 100 microcells or droplets, such that each droplet either amplifies (e.g., generation of an amplification product provides evidence of the presence of at least one template molecule in the microcell or droplet) or fails to amplify (evidence that the template was not present in a given microcell or droplet). By simply counting the number of positive microcells, it is possible directly to count the number of target genomes that are present in an input sample.

Digital PCR methods typically use an endpoint readout, rather than a conventional quantitative PCR signal that is measured after each cycle in the thermal cycling reaction (see, e.g., Pekin et al., 2011 Lab. Chip 11(13):2156; Zhong et al., 2011 Lab. Chip 11(13):2167; Tewhey et al., 2009 Nature Biotechnol. 27:1025; 2010 Nature Biotechnol. 28:178; Vogelstein and Kinzler, 1999 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 96:9236-41; Pohl and Shih, 2004 Expert Rev. Mol. Diagn. 4(1); 41-7, 2004). Compared with traditional PCR, dPCR has the following advantages: (1) there is no need to rely on references or standards, (2) desired precision may be achieved by increasing the total number of PCR replicates, (3) it is highly tolerant to inhibitors, (4) it is capable of analyzing complex mixtures, and (5) it provides a linear response to the number of copies present in a sample to allow for small change in the copy number to be detected. Accordingly, any of the herein described compositions (e.g., template compositions and adaptive immune receptor gene-specific oligonucleotide primer sets) and methods may be adapted for use in such digital PCR methodology, for example, the ABI QuantStudio™ 12K Flex System (Life Technologies, Carlsbad, Calif.), the QX100™ Droplet Digital™ PCR system (BioRad, Hercules, Calif.), the QuantaLife™ digital PCR system (BioRad, Hercules, Calif.) or the RainDance™ microdroplet digital PCR system (RainDance Technologies, Lexington, Mass.).

Adaptors

The herein described template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) also may in certain embodiments comprise first (U1) and second (U2) universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequences, or may lack either or both of U1 and U2. U1 thus may comprise either nothing or an oligonucleotide having a sequence that is selected from (i) a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a first sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and U2 may comprise either nothing or an oligonucleotide having a sequence that is selected from (i) a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a second sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence.

U1 and/or U2 may, for example, comprise universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequences and/or sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences that are specific to a single-molecule sequencing technology being employed, for example the HiSeq™ or GeneAnalyzer™-2 (GA-2) systems (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) or another suitable sequencing suite of instrumentation, reagents and software. Inclusion of such platform-specific adaptor sequences permits direct quantitative sequencing of the presently described template composition, which comprises a plurality of different template oligonucleotides of general formula (I), using a nucleotide sequencing methodology such as the HiSeq™ or GA2 or equivalent. This feature therefore advantageously permits qualitative and quantitative characterization of the template composition.

In particular, the ability to sequence all components of the template composition directly allows for verification that each template oligonucleotide in the plurality of template oligonucleotides is present in a substantially equimolar amount. For example, a set of the presently described template oligonucleotides may be generated that have universal adaptor sequences at both ends, so that the adaptor sequences can be used to further incorporate sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotides at each end of each template.

Without wishing to be bound by theory, platform-specific oligonucleotides may be added onto the ends of such modified templates using 5′ (5′-platform sequence-universal adaptor-1 sequence-3′) and 3′ (5′-platform sequence-universal adaptor-2 sequence-3′) oligonucleotides in as little as two cycles of denaturation, annealing and extension, so that the relative representation in the template composition of each of the component template oligonucleotides is not quantitatively altered. Unique identifier sequences (e.g., barcode sequences B comprising unique V and B oligonucleotide sequences that are associated with and thus identify, respectively, individual V and J regions, as described herein) are placed adjacent to the adaptor sequences, thus permitting quantitative sequencing in short sequence reads, in order to characterize the template population by the criterion of the relative amount of each unique template sequence that is present.

Where such direct quantitative sequencing indicates that one or more particular oligonucleotides may be over- or underrepresented in a preparation of the template composition, adjustment of the template composition can be made accordingly to obtain a template composition in which all oligonucleotides are present in substantially equimolar amounts. The template composition in which all oligonucleotides are present in substantially equimolar amounts may then be used as a calibration standard for amplification primer sets, such as in the presently disclosed methods for determining and correcting non-uniform amplification potential among members of a primer set.

In addition to adaptor sequences described in the Examples and included in the exemplary template sequences in the Sequence Listing (e.g., at the 5′ and 3′ ends of SEQ ID NOS:1-1630), other oligonucleotide sequences that may be used as universal adaptor sequences will be known to those familiar with the art in view of the present disclosure, including selection of adaptor oligonucleotide sequences that are distinct from sequences found in other portions of the herein described templates. Non-limiting examples of additional adaptor sequences are shown in Table 2 and set forth in SEQ ID NOS:1710-1731.

TABLE 2 Exemplary Adaptor Sequences Adaptor SEQ ID (primer) name Sequence NO: T7 Promotor AATACGACTCACTATAGG 1710 T7 Terminator GCTAGTTATTGCTCAGCGG 1711 T3 ATTAACCCTCACTAAAGG 1712 SP6 GATTTAGGTGACACTATAG 1713 M13F(-21) TGTAAAACGACGGCCAGT 1714 M13F(-40) GTTTTCCCAGTCACGAC 1715 M13R Reverse CAGGAAACAGCTATGACC 1716 AOX1 Forward GACTGGTTCCAATTGACAAGC 1717 AOX1 Reverse GCAAATGGCATTCTGACATCC 1718 pGEX Forward  GGGCTGGCAAGCCACGTTTGGTG 1719 (GST 5, pGEX 5′) pGEX Reverse  CGGGAGCTGCATGTGTCAGAGG 1720 (GST 3, pGEX 3′) BGH Reverse AACTAGAAGGCACAGTCGAGGC 1721 GFP (C terminal, CACTCTCGGCATGGACGAGC 1722 CFP, YFP or BFP) GFP Reverse TGGTGCAGATGAACTTCAGG 1723 GAG GTTCGACCCCGCCTCGATCC 1724 GAG Reverse TGACACACATTCCACAGGGTC 1725 CYC1 Reverse GCGTGAATGTAAGCGTGAC 1726 pFastBacF 5′-d(GGATTATTCATACCGTCCCA)-3′ 1727 pFastBacR 5′-d(CAAATGTGGTATGGCTGATT)-3′ 1728 pBAD Forward 5′-d(ATGCCATAGCATTTTTATCC)-3′ 1729 pBAD Reverse 5′-d(GATTTAATCTGTATCAGG)-3′ 1730 CMV-Forward 5′-d(CGCAATGGGCGGTAGGCGTG)-3′ 1731

Barcodes

As described herein, certain embodiments contemplate designing the template oligonucleotide sequences to contain short signature sequences that permit unambiguous identification of the template sequence, and hence of at least one primer responsible for amplifying that template, without having to sequence the entire amplification product. In the herein described template oligonucleotides of general formula (I), B1, B2, B3, and B4 are each independently either nothing or each comprises an oligonucleotide B that comprises an oligonucleotide barcode sequence of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900 or 1000 or more contiguous nucleotides (including all integer values therebetween), wherein in each of the plurality of template oligonucleotide sequences B comprises a unique oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies, as a paired combination, (i) the unique V oligonucleotide sequence of the template oligonucleotide and (ii) the unique J oligonucleotide sequence of the template oligonucleotide.

Thus, for instance, template oligonucleotides having barcode identifier sequences may permit relatively short amplification product sequence reads, such as barcode sequence reads of no more than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 400, 300, 200, 100, 90, 80, 70, 60, 55, 50, 45, 40, 35, 30, 25, 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4 or fewer nucleotides, followed by matching this barcode sequence information to the associated V and J sequences that are incorporated into the template having the barcode as part of the template design. By this approach, a large number of amplification products can be simultaneously partially sequenced by high throughput parallel sequencing, to identify primers that are responsible for amplification bias in a complex primer set.

Exemplary barcodes may comprise a first barcode oligonucleotide of 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 or 16 nucleotides that uniquely identifies each V polynucleotide in the template and a second barcode oligonucleotide of 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 or 16 nucleotides that uniquely identifies each J polynucleotide in the template, to provide barcodes of, respectively, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 or 32 nucleotides in length, but these and related embodiments are not intended to be so limited. Barcode oligonucleotides may comprise oligonucleotide sequences of any length, so long as a minimum barcode length is obtained that precludes occurrence of a given barcode sequence in two or more template oligonucleotides having otherwise distinct sequences (e.g., V and J sequences).

Thus, the minimum barcode length, to avoid such redundancy amongst the barcodes that are used to uniquely identify different V-J sequence pairings, is X nucleotides, where 4^(x) is greater than the number of distinct template species that are to be differentiated on the basis of having non-identical sequences. For example, for the set of 871 template oligonucleotides set forth herein as SEQ ID NOS:1-871, the minimum barcode length would be five nucleotides, which would permit a theoretical total of 1024 (i.e., greater than 871) different possible pentanucleotide sequences. In practice, barcode oligonucleotide sequence read lengths may be limited only by the sequence read-length limits of the nucleotide sequencing instrument to be employed. For certain embodiments, different barcode oligonucleotides that will distinguish individual species of template oligonucleotides should have at least two nucleotide mismatches (e.g., a minimum hamming distance of 2) when aligned to maximize the number of nucleotides that match at particular positions in the barcode oligonucleotide sequences.

In preferred embodiments, for each distinct template oligonucleotide species having a unique sequence within the template composition of general formula (I), B1, B2, B3, and B4 will be identical.

The skilled artisan will be familiar with the design, synthesis, and incorporation into a larger oligonucleotide or polynucleotide construct, of oligonucleotide barcode sequences of, for instance, at least 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 300, 500 or more contiguous nucleotides, including all integer values therebetween. For non-limiting examples of the design and implementation of oligonucleotide barcode sequence identification strategies, see, e.g., de Carcer et al., 2011 Adv. Env. Microbiol. 77:6310; Parameswaran et al., 2007 Nucl. Ac. Res. 35(19):330; Roh et al., 2010 Trends Biotechnol. 28:291.

Typically, barcodes are placed in templates at locations where they are not found naturally, i.e., barcodes comprise nucleotide sequences that are distinct from any naturally occurring oligonucleotide sequences that may be found in the vicinity of the sequences adjacent to which the barcodes are situated (e.g., V and/or J sequences). Such barcode sequences may be included, according to certain embodiments described herein, as elements B1, B2 and/or B3 of the presently disclosed template oligonucleotide of general formula (I). Accordingly, certain of the herein described template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) may also in certain embodiments comprise one, two or all three of barcodes B1, B2 and B3, while in certain other embodiments some or all of these barcodes may be absent. In certain embodiments all barcode sequences will have identical or similar GC content (e.g., differing in GC content by no more than 20%, or by no more than 19, 18, 17, 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11 or 10%).

In the template compositions according to certain herein disclosed embodiments the barcode-containing element B (e.g., B1, B2, B3, and/or B4) comprises the oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies a single paired V-J combination. Optionally and in certain embodiments the barcode-containing element B may also include a random nucleotide, or a random polynucleotide sequence of at least 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 300, 500 or more contiguous nucleotides, situated upstream and/or downstream of the specific barcode sequence that uniquely identifies each specific paired V-J combination. When present both upstream and downstream of the specific barcode sequence, the random nucleotide or random polynucleotide sequence are independent of one another, that is, they may but need not comprise the same nucleotide or the same polynucleotide sequence.

Restriction Enzyme Sites

According to certain embodiments disclosed herein, the template oligonucleotide may comprise a restriction endonuclease (RE) recognition site that is situated between the V and J sequences and does not occur elsewhere in the template oligonucleotide sequence. The RE recognition site may optionally be adjacent to a barcode site that identifies the V region sequence. The RE site may be included for any of a number of purposes, including without limitation as a structural feature that may be exploited to destroy templates selectively by contacting them with the appropriate restriction enzyme. It may be desirable to degrade the present template oligonucleotides selectively by contacting them with a suitable RE, for example, to remove template oligonucleotides from other compositions into which they may have been deliberately or accidentally introduced. Alternatively, the RE site may be usefully exploited in the course of sequencing template oligonucleotides in the template composition, and/or as a positional sequence marker in a template oligonucleotide sequence regardless of whether or not it is cleaved with a restriction enzyme. An exemplary RE site is the oligonucleotide motif GTCGAC, which is recognized by the restriction enzyme Sal I. A large number of additional restriction enzymes and their respective RE recognition site sequences are known in the art and are available commercially (e.g., New England Biolabs, Beverly, Mass.). These include, for example, EcoRI (GAATTC) and SphI (GCATGC). Those familiar with the art will appreciate that any of a variety of such RE recognition sites may be incorporated into particular embodiments of the presently disclosed template oligonucleotides.

Sequencing

Sequencing may be performed using any of a variety of available high through-put single molecule sequencing machines and systems. Illustrative sequence systems include sequence-by-synthesis systems such as the Illumina Genome Analyzer and associated instruments (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.), Helicos Genetic Analysis System (Helicos BioSciences Corp., Cambridge, Mass.), Pacific Biosciences PacBio RS (Pacific Biosciences, Menlo Park, Calif.), or other systems having similar capabilities. Sequencing is achieved using a set of sequencing oligonucleotides that hybridize to a defined region within the amplified DNA molecules. The sequencing oligonucleotides are designed such that the V- and J-encoding gene segments can be uniquely identified by the sequences that are generated, based on the present disclosure and in view of known adaptive immune receptor gene sequences that appear in publicly available databases. See, e.g., U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126; U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507; PCT/US2011/026373; or PCT/US2011/049012. Exemplary TCRB J-region sequencing primers are set forth in Table 3:

TABLE 3 TCRBJ Sequencing Primers SEQ ID PRIMER SEQUENCE NO: >Jseq1-1 ACAACTGTGAGTCTGGTGCCTTGTCCAAAGAAA 1696 >Jseq1-2 ACAACGGTTAACCTGGTCCCCGAACCGAAGGTG 1697 >Jseq1-3 ACAACAGTGAGCCAACTTCCCTCTCCAAAATAT 1698 >Jseq1-4 AAGACAGAGAGCTGGGTTCCACTGCCAAAAAAC 1699 >Jseq1-5 AGGATGGAGAGTCGAGTCCCATCACCAAAATGC 1700 >Jseq1-6 GTCACAGTGAGCCTGGTCCCGTTCCCAAAGTGG 1701 >Jseq2-1 AGCACGGTGAGCCGTGTCCCTGGCCCGAAGAAC 1702 >Jseq2-2 AGTACGGTCAGCCTAGAGCCTTCTCCAAAAAAC 1703 >Jseq2-3 AGCACTGTCAGCCGGGTGCCTGGGCCAAAATAC 1704 >Jseq2-4 AGCACTGAGAGCCGGGTCCCGGCGCCGAAGTAC 1705 >Jseq2-5 AGCACCAGGAGCCGCGTGCCTGGCCCGAAGTAC 1706 >Jseq2-6 AGCACGGTCAGCCTGCTGCCGGCCCCGAAAGTC 1707 >Jseq2-7 GTGACCGTGAGCCTGGTGCCCGGCCCGAAGTAC 1708

The term “gene” means the segment of DNA involved in producing a polypeptide chain such as all or a portion of a TCR or Ig polypeptide (e.g., a CDR3-containing polypeptide); it includes regions preceding and following the coding region “leader and trailer” as well as intervening sequences (introns) between individual coding segments (exons), and may also include regulatory elements (e.g., promoters, enhancers, repressor binding sites and the like), and may also include recombination signal sequences (RSSs) as described herein.

The nucleic acids of the present embodiments, also referred to herein as polynucleotides, may be in the form of RNA or in the form of DNA, which DNA includes cDNA, genomic DNA, and synthetic DNA. The DNA may be double-stranded or single-stranded, and if single stranded may be the coding strand or non-coding (anti-sense) strand. A coding sequence which encodes a TCR or an immunoglobulin or a region thereof (e.g., a V region, a D segment, a J region, a C region, etc.) for use according to the present embodiments may be identical to the coding sequence known in the art for any given TCR or immunoglobulin gene regions or polypeptide domains (e.g., V-region domains, CDR3 domains, etc.), or may be a different coding sequence, which, as a result of the redundancy or degeneracy of the genetic code, encodes the same TCR or immunoglobulin region or polypeptide.

In certain embodiments, the amplified J-region encoding gene segments may each have a unique sequence-defined identifier tag of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 or about 15, 20 or more nucleotides, situated at a defined position relative to a RSS site. For example, a four-base tag may be used, in the JP-region encoding segment of amplified TCRP CDR3-encoding regions, at positions +11 through +14 downstream from the RSS site. However, these and related embodiments need not be so limited and also contemplate other relatively short nucleotide sequence-defined identifier tags that may be detected in J-region encoding gene segments and defined based on their positions relative to an RSS site. These may vary between different adaptive immune receptor encoding loci.

The recombination signal sequence (RSS) consists of two conserved sequences (heptamer, 5′-CACAGTG-3′, and nonamer, 5′-ACAAAAACC-3′), separated by a spacer of either 12+/−1 bp (“12-signal”) or 23+/−1 bp (“23-signal”). A number of nucleotide positions have been identified as important for recombination including the CA dinucleotide at position one and two of the heptamer, and a C at heptamer position three has also been shown to be strongly preferred as well as an A nucleotide at positions 5, 6, 7 of the nonamer. (Ramsden et. al 1994; Akamatsu et. al. 1994; Hesse et. al. 1989). Mutations of other nucleotides have minimal or inconsistent effects. The spacer, although more variable, also has an impact on recombination, and single-nucleotide replacements have been shown to significantly impact recombination efficiency (Fanning et. al. 1996, Larijani et. al 1999; Nadel et. al. 1998). Criteria have been described for identifying RSS polynucleotide sequences having significantly different recombination efficiencies (Ramsden et. al 1994; Akamatsu et. al. 1994; Hesse et. al. 1989 and Cowell et. al. 1994). Accordingly, the sequencing oligonucleotides may hybridize adjacent to a four base tag within the amplified J-encoding gene segments at positions +11 through +14 downstream of the RSS site. For example, sequencing oligonucleotides for TCRB may be designed to anneal to a consensus nucleotide motif observed just downstream of this “tag”, so that the first four bases of a sequence read will uniquely identify the J-encoding gene segment (see, e.g., WO/2012/027503).

The average length of the CDR3-encoding region, for the TCR, defined as the nucleotides encoding the TCR polypeptide between the second conserved cysteine of the V segment and the conserved phenylalanine of the J segment, is 35+/−3 nucleotides. Accordingly and in certain embodiments, PCR amplification using V-segment oligonucleotide primers with J-segment oligonucleotide primers that start from the J segment tag of a particular TCR or IgH J region (e.g., TCR Jβ, TCR Jγ or IgH JH as described herein) will nearly always capture the complete V-D-J junction in a 50 base pair read. The average length of the IgH CDR3 region, defined as the nucleotides between the conserved cysteine in the V segment and the conserved phenylalanine in the J segment, is less constrained than at the TCRβ locus, but will typically be between about 10 and about 70 nucleotides. Accordingly and in certain embodiments, PCR amplification using V-segment oligonucleotide primers with J-segment oligonucleotide primers that start from the IgH J segment tag will capture the complete V-D-J junction in a 100 base pair read.

PCR primers that anneal to and support polynucleotide extension on mismatched template sequences are referred to as promiscuous primers. In certain embodiments, the TCR and Ig J-segment reverse PCR primers may be designed to minimize overlap with the sequencing oligonucleotides, in order to minimize promiscuous priming in the context of multiplex PCR. In one embodiment, the TCR and Ig J-segment reverse primers may be anchored at the 3′ end by annealing to the consensus splice site motif, with minimal overlap of the sequencing primers. Generally, the TCR and Ig V and J-segment primers may be selected to operate in PCR at consistent annealing temperatures using known sequence/primer design and analysis programs under default parameters.

For the sequencing reaction, the exemplary IGHJ sequencing primers extend three nucleotides across the conserved CAG sequences as described in WO/2012/027503.

Samples

The subject or biological source, from which a test biological sample may be obtained, may be a human or non-human animal, or a transgenic or cloned or tissue-engineered (including through the use of stem cells) organism. In certain preferred embodiments of the invention, the subject or biological source may be known to have, or may be suspected of having or being at risk for having, a circulating or solid tumor or other malignant condition, or an autoimmune disease, or an inflammatory condition, and in certain preferred embodiments of the invention the subject or biological source may be known to be free of a risk or presence of such disease.

Certain preferred embodiments contemplate a subject or biological source that is a human subject such as a patient that has been diagnosed as having or being at risk for developing or acquiring cancer according to art-accepted clinical diagnostic criteria, such as those of the U.S. National Cancer Institute (Bethesda, Md., USA) or as described in DeVita, Hellman, and Rosenberg's Cancer: Principles and Practice of Oncology (2008, Lippincott, Williams and Wilkins, Philadelphia/Ovid, New York); Pizzo and Poplack, Principles and Practice of Pediatric Oncology (Fourth edition, 2001, Lippincott, Williams and Wilkins, Philadelphia/Ovid, New York); and Vogelstein and Kinzler, The Genetic Basis of Human Cancer (Second edition, 2002, McGraw Hill Professional, New York); certain embodiments contemplate a human subject that is known to be free of a risk for having, developing or acquiring cancer by such criteria.

Certain other embodiments contemplate a non-human subject or biological source, for example a non-human primate such as a macaque, chimpanzee, gorilla, vervet, orangutan, baboon or other non-human primate, including such non-human subjects that may be known to the art as preclinical models, including preclinical models for solid tumors and/or other cancers. Certain other embodiments contemplate a non-human subject that is a mammal, for example, a mouse, rat, rabbit, pig, sheep, horse, bovine, goat, gerbil, hamster, guinea pig or other mammal; many such mammals may be subjects that are known to the art as preclinical models for certain diseases or disorders, including circulating or solid tumors and/or other cancers (e.g., Talmadge et al., 2007 Am. J. Pathol. 170:793; Kerbel, 2003 Canc. Biol. Therap. 2(4 Suppl 1):S134; Man et al., 2007 Canc. Met. Rev. 26:737; Cespedes et al., 2006 Clin. Transl. Oncol. 8:318). The range of embodiments is not intended to be so limited, however, such that there are also contemplated other embodiments in which the subject or biological source may be a non-mammalian vertebrate, for example, another higher vertebrate, or an avian, amphibian or reptilian species, or another subject or biological source.

Biological samples may be provided by obtaining a blood sample, biopsy specimen, tissue explant, organ culture, biological fluid or any other tissue or cell preparation from a subject or a biological source. Preferably the sample comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of the subject or biological source, which, by way of illustration and not limitation, may contain rearranged DNA at one or more TCR or BCR loci. In certain embodiments a test biological sample may be obtained from a solid tissue (e.g., a solid tumor), for example by surgical resection, needle biopsy or other means for obtaining a test biological sample that contains a mixture of cells.

According to certain embodiments, it may be desirable to isolate lymphoid cells (e.g., T cells and/or B cells) according to any of a large number of established methodologies, where isolated lymphoid cells are those that have been removed or separated from the tissue, environment or milieu in which they naturally occur. B cells and T cells can thus be obtained from a biological sample, such as from a variety of tissue and biological fluid samples including bone marrow, thymus, lymph glands, lymph nodes, peripheral tissues and blood, but peripheral blood is most easily accessed. Any peripheral tissue can be sampled for the presence of B and T cells and is therefore contemplated for use in the methods described herein. Tissues and biological fluids from which adaptive immune cells, may be obtained include, but are not limited to skin, epithelial tissues, colon, spleen, a mucosal secretion, oral mucosa, intestinal mucosa, vaginal mucosa or a vaginal secretion, cervical tissue, ganglia, saliva, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), bone marrow, cord blood, serum, serosal fluid, plasma, lymph, urine, ascites fluid, pleural fluid, pericardial fluid, peritoneal fluid, abdominal fluid, culture medium, conditioned culture medium or lavage fluid. In certain embodiments, adaptive immune cells may be isolated from an apheresis sample. Peripheral blood samples may be obtained by phlebotomy from subjects. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) are isolated by techniques known to those of skill in the art, e.g., by Ficoll-Hypaque® density gradient separation. In certain embodiments, whole PBMCs are used for analysis.

For nucleic acid extraction, total genomic DNA may be extracted from cells using methods known in the art and/or commercially available kits, e.g., by using the QIAamp® DNA blood Mini Kit)(QIAGEN®. The approximate mass of a single haploid genome is 3 pg. Preferably, at least 100,000 to 200,000 cells are used for analysis, i.e., about 0.6 to 1.2 μg DNA from diploid T or B cells. Using PBMCs as a source, the number of T cells can be estimated to be about 30% of total cells. The number of B cells can also be estimated to be about 30% of total cells in a PBMC preparation.

The Ig and TCR gene loci contain many different variable (V), diversity (D), and joining (J) gene segments, which are subjected to rearrangement processes during early lymphoid differentiation. Ig and TCR V, D and J gene segment sequences are known in the art and are available in public databases such as GENBANK. The V-D-J rearrangements are mediated via a recombinase enzyme complex in which the RAG1 and RAG2 proteins play a key role by recognizing and cutting the DNA at the recombination signal sequences (RSS), which are located downstream of the V gene segments, at both sides of the D gene segments, and upstream of the J gene segments. Inappropriate RSS reduce or even completely prevent rearrangement. The recombination signal sequence (RSS) includes two consensus sequences (heptamer, 5′-CACAGTG-3′, and nonamer, 5′-ACAAAAACC-3′), separated by a spacer of either 12+/−1 bp (“12-signal”) or 23+/−1 bp (“23-signal”). At the 3′ end of the V segment and D segment the RSS sequence is heptamer (CACAGTG)-spacer-nonamer (ACAAAAACC). At the 5′ end of the J segment and D segment the RSS sequence is nonamer (GGTTTTTGT)-spacer-heptamer (CACTGTG), with substantial sequence variation in the heptamer and nonamer sequence of each specific gene segment.

A number of nucleotide positions have been identified as important for recombination including the CA dinucleotide at position one and two of the heptamer, and a C at heptamer position three has also been shown to be strongly preferred as well as an A nucleotide at positions 5, 6, 7 of the nonamer. (Ramsden et. al 1994 Nucl. Ac. Res. 22:1785; Akamatsu et. al. 1994 J. Immunol. 153:4520; Hesse et. al. 1989 Genes Dev. 3:1053). Mutations of other nucleotides have minimal or inconsistent effects. The spacer, although more variable, also has an impact on recombination, and single-nucleotide replacements have been shown to significantly impact recombination efficiency (Fanning et. al. 1996 Cell. Immunol. Immumnopath. 79:1, Larijani et. al 1999 Nucl. Ac. Res. 27:2304; Nadel et. al. 1998 J. Immunol. 161:6068; Nadel et al., 1998 J. Exp. Med. 187:1495). Criteria have been described for identifying RSS polynucleotide sequences having significantly different recombination efficiencies (Ramsden et. al 1994 Nucl. Ac. Res. 22:1785; Akamatsu et. al. 1994 J. Immunol. 153:4520; Hesse et. al. 1989 Genes Dev. 3:1053, and Lee et al., 2003 PLoS 1(1):E1).

The rearrangement process at the Ig heavy chain (IgH), TCR beta (TCRB), and TCR delta (TCRD) genes generally starts with a D to J rearrangement followed by a V to D-J rearrangement, while direct V to J rearrangements occur at Ig kappa (IgK), Ig lambda (IgL), TCR alpha (TCRA), and TCR gamma (TCRG) genes. The sequences between rearranging gene segments are generally deleted in the form of a circular excision product, also called TCR excision circle (TREC) or B cell receptor excision circle (BREC).

The many different combinations of V, D, and J gene segments represent the so-called combinatorial repertoire, which is estimated to be ˜2×10⁶ for Ig molecules, ˜3×10⁶ for TCRαβ and ˜5×10³ for TCRγδ molecules. At the junction sites of the V, D, and J gene segments, deletion and random insertion of nucleotides occurs during the rearrangement process, resulting in highly diverse junctional regions, which significantly contribute to the total repertoire of Ig and TCR molecules, estimated to be >10¹² possible amino acid sequences.

Mature B-lymphocytes further extend their Ig repertoire upon antigen recognition in germinal centers via somatic hypermutation, a process leading to affinity maturation of the Ig molecules. The somatic hypermutation process focuses on the V-(D−) J exon of IgH and Ig light chain genes and primarily generates single nucleotide mutations but sometimes also insertions or deletions of nucleotides. Somatically-mutated Ig genes are also typically found in mature B-cell malignancies.

In certain embodiments described herein, V-segment and J-segment primers may be employed in a PCR reaction to amplify rearranged TCR or BCR CDR3-encoding DNA regions in a test biological sample, wherein each functional TCR or Ig V-encoding gene segment comprises a V gene recombination signal sequence (RSS) and each functional TCR or Ig J-encoding gene segment comprises a J gene RSS. In these and related embodiments, each amplified rearranged DNA molecule may comprise (i) at least about 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900, 1000 (including all integer values therebetween) or more contiguous nucleotides of a sense strand of the TCR or Ig V-encoding gene segment, with the at least about 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 900, 1000 or more contiguous nucleotides being situated 5′ to the V gene RSS and/or each amplified rearranged DNA molecule may comprise (ii) at least about 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 (including all integer values therebetween) or more contiguous nucleotides of a sense strand of the TCR or Ig J-encoding gene segment, with the at least about 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 or more contiguous nucleotides being situated 3′ to the J gene RSS.

Amplification Factor Determination

In addition to the use of the presently disclosed template compositions for standardizing amplification efficiency of oligonucleotide amplification primer sets as described herein, certain other embodiments contemplate use of the template composition to determine amplification factors for estimating the number of rearranged adaptive immune receptor encoding sequences in a sample. These and related embodiments may find use to quantify the number of adaptive immune receptor encoding sequences in a DNA sample that has been obtained from lymphoid cells, including lymphoid cells that are present in a mixture of cells that comprises cells in which DNA encoding an adaptive immune receptor has undergone DNA rearrangement, but where the sample also contains DNA from cells in which no such rearrangement has taken place (e.g., non-lymphoid cells, immature cells, mesenchymal cells, cancer cells, etc.).

The total number of different members of a given class of adaptive immune receptors (e.g., TCRs or IGs) in a subject may be estimated by multiplexed PCR using a comprehensive V-J amplification primer set followed by quantitative sequencing of amplification products. Multiplexed amplification and high throughput sequencing of rearranged TCR and BCR (IG) encoding DNA sequences are described, for example, in Robins et al., 2009 Blood 114, 4099; Robins et al., 2010 Sci. Translat. Med. 2:47ra64; Robins et al., 2011 J. Immunol. Meth. doi:10.1016/j.jim.2011.09. 001; Sherwood et al. 2011 Sci. Translat. Med. 3:90ra61; U.S. Ser. No. 13/217,126 (US Pub. No. 2012/0058902), U.S. Ser. No. 12/794,507 (US Pub. No. 2010/0330571), WO/2010/151416, WO/2011/106738 (PCT/US2011/026373), WO2012/027503 (PCT/US2011/049012), U.S. Ser. No. 61/550,311, and U.S. Ser. No. 61/569,118.

This methodology typically involves sampling DNA from a subpopulation of lymphoid cells, such as lymphoid cells that are present in a blood sample, which is known also to contain nucleated cells that lack rearranged TCR or IG encoding DNA. The present compositions and methods may permit improved accuracy and precision in the determination of the number of rearranged TCR and IG encoding DNA molecules in such a sample. As described herein, for instance, by spiking the DNA sample with the present template composition, an internal amplification template standard is provided for assessing the relative efficiencies across the range of oligonucleotide primers that are present in the multiplexed amplification primer set. By so assessing the amplification products of the present artificial template composition, which is added to the amplification reaction in known amounts, an amplification factor (e.g., a multiplicative, normalizing, scaling or geometric factor, etc.) can be determined for the oligonucleotide amplification primer set and can then be used to calculate the number of natural DNA templates in the sample.

As another example, these and related embodiments permit quantification of Minimal Residual Disease (MRD) in lymphoma or leukemia, by quantitative detection of rearranged TCR or IG encoding DNA in samples obtained from mixed preparations of lymphoid and non-lymphoid cells, including persistent lymphoma or leukemia cells. Prior methods determine MRD as the number of malignant cells that are detectable as a proportion of the total number of cells in a sample. In contrast, the present methods permit estimation of the total number of cells in a sample that have rearranged TCR or IG encoding DNA, so that malignant cells (e.g., those having a particular TCR or IG rearrangement, such as a clonotype) can be quantified as a proportion of such rearranged cells instead of as a proportion of all cells. By way of non-limiting theory, it is believed that because the representation of all rearranged cells in a clinical sample from a subject having or suspected of having MRD is typically very low, the present methods will dramatically improve the sensitivity with which MRD can be detected, including improving such sensitivity by increasing the signal-to-noise ratio.

Accordingly certain embodiments thus provide a method for quantifying rearranged DNA molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells of a subject, each adaptive immune receptor comprising a variable region and a joining region. Briefly, the method comprises the steps of:

(A) in a multiplexed amplification reaction using the herein described oligonucleotide amplification primer set that is capable of amplifying substantially all V-J encoding combinations for a given adaptive immune receptor, amplifying DNA from the sample to which has been added a known amount of the herein described template composition for standardizing amplification efficiency, to obtain amplification products;

(B) quantitatively sequencing the amplification products of (A) to quantify (i) template amplification products, which are amplification products of the herein described template composition and will be identifiable because they contain at least one barcode oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) amplification products of rearranged adaptive immune receptor encoding DNA sequences in the sample, which will be identifiable because they contain specific V and J sequences but lack an oligonucleotide barcode sequence;

(C) calculating an amplification factor based on quantitative information obtained in step (B); and

(D) using the amplification factor of (C) to determine, by calculation, the number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding DNA molecules in the sample.

Without wishing to be bound by theory, according to these and related methods, the number of rearranged TCR or IG encoding DNA molecules that are sampled in a multiplexed amplification reaction is measured. To do so, a sequence coverage value, e.g., the number of output sequence reads that are determined for each input (template) molecule, is determined and averaged across the entire number of different template oligonucleotides that are present, to obtain an average sequence coverage value. By dividing (i) the number of reads that are obtained for a given sequence by (ii) the average sequence coverage value, the number of rearranged molecules that are present as templates at the start of the amplification reaction can be calculated.

Thus, for example, to calculate the sequence coverage value, a known quantity of a set of synthetic molecules of the presently disclosed template composition is added to each PCR amplification, the synthetic templates having the basic structure of formula (I) 5′ U-B1-V-B2-R-(B3)-J-B4-U 3′ where each V is a 300 base pair segment having a sequence that matches a TCR or IG V gene sequence and J is a 100 base pair segment having a sequence that matches a TCR or IG J gene. B2 is a unique barcode oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies each VJ pair and that also differentiates amplification products of the synthetic DNA templates (which will contain the barcode sequence) from amplification products of naturally occurring biologic template DNA molecules that are contributed by the lymphoid DNA sample (which will lack the barcode sequence). In this example, B3 of formula (I) is nothing. After PCR amplification and sequencing, the numbers of each sequenced synthetic molecule (i.e., amplification products containing the barcode sequence) are counted. The sequence coverage of the synthetic molecules is then calculated based on the known number of starting synthetic template molecules used to spike the amplification reaction.

For example, a pool of 5000 synthetic, barcode-containing template molecules comprising 4-5 copies each of 1100 unique synthetic template oligonucleotide sequences (representing every possible VJ pair) may be added to the amplification reaction. If the amplification products include 50,000 sequences that match the synthetic template molecules, a sequence coverage value of 10× has been obtained and the amplification factor is 10. To estimate the number of natural VDJ-rearranged template molecules in the DNA obtained from the sample, the number of amplification products of the natural templates (i.e., amplification products that lack any barcode sequence) is then divided by the amplification factor. For added accuracy, because in this example the 5000 synthetic molecules are a complex pool of 1100 molecules representing every VJ pair, the amplification factor for every VJ pair can be individually calculated. The amplification factor can then be averaged across all of the synthetic molecules (FIG. 8). The accuracy and robustness of the method is shown in FIG. 9 and details are described below in Example 5.

In an alternative embodiment, identical to what is described above and below in this section, except differing in the use of a subset of the total pool of synthetic template molecules is used in a manner resulting in the addition to a sample of not more than 1 copy of a subset of distinct template molecules to the sample. Application of Poisson statistical methods well known to the ordinarily skilled artisan are used to determine the amount of template to add based upon the known properties of the pool (e.g., the total number of distinct sequences and the concentration of template molecules). For example, 200-500 template molecules are added to the amplification reaction, such that there is on average not more than one copy each of a subset of template molecules present in the pool.

Accordingly, in these embodiments the method comprises: (A) amplifying DNA in a multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) that comprises: (1) DNA from the biological sample that comprises lymphoid cells of the subject, (2) the template composition of claim 1 in which a known number of each of the plurality of template oligonucleotides having a unique oligonucleotide sequence is present, (3) an oligonucleotide amplification primer set that is capable of amplifying rearranged DNA encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in the DNA from the biological sample, the primer set comprising: (a) in substantially equimolar amounts, a plurality of V-segment oligonucleotide primers that are each independently capable of specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor V-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each V-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segment and wherein the plurality of V-segment primers specifically hybridize to substantially all functional adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments that are present in the template composition, and (b) in substantially equimolar amounts, a plurality of J-segment oligonucleotide primers that are each independently capable of specifically hybridizing to at least one polynucleotide encoding an adaptive immune receptor J-region polypeptide or to the complement thereof, wherein each J-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segment and wherein the plurality of J-segment primers specifically hybridize to substantially all functional adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments that are present in the template composition, wherein the V-segment and J-segment oligonucleotide primers are capable of promoting amplification in said multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of (i) substantially all template oligonucleotides in the template composition to produce a multiplicity of amplified template DNA molecules, said multiplicity of amplified template DNA molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the template oligonucleotides in the template composition, and (ii) substantially all rearranged DNA molecules encoding adaptive immune receptors in the biological sample to produce a multiplicity of amplified rearranged DNA molecules, said multiplicity of amplified rearranged DNA molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the rearranged DNA molecules in the DNA from the biological sample, and wherein each amplified DNA molecule in the multiplicity of amplified template DNA molecules and in the multiplicity of amplified rearranged DNA molecules is less than 1000, 900, 800, 700, 600, 500, 400, 300, 200, 100, 90, 80 or 70 nucleotides in length;

(B) quantitatively sequencing all or a sufficient portion of each of said amplified template DNA molecules and each of said amplified rearranged DNA molecules to quantify (i) a template product number of amplified template DNA molecules which contain at least one oligonucleotide barcode sequence, and (ii) a rearranged product number of amplified rearranged DNA molecules which lack an oligonucleotide barcode sequence;

(C) calculating an amplification factor by dividing the template product number of (B)(i) by the known number of each of the plurality of template oligonucleotides having a unique oligonucleotide sequence of (A)(2); and

(D) dividing the rearranged product number of (B)(ii) by the amplification factor calculated in (C) to quantify unique adaptive immune receptor encoding DNA molecules in the sample.

The contemplated embodiments are not intended to be limited to the above described method, such that from the present disclosure the skilled person will appreciate variations that may be employed. An alternative approach, for example, may not use the herein described synthetic template composition as a spiked-in control template in multiplexed PCR amplification of a DNA sample that contains rearranged lymphoid cell TCR and/or IG encoding DNA as well as non-rearranged DNA. Instead, according to one such alternative, to the amplification reaction using V and J amplification primers may be added a known set of oligonucleotide amplification primers that amplify a distinct, highly conserved genomic sequence region. These genomic control primers may amplify every genome that is present in the DNA sample regardless of whether or not it contains rearranged TCR and/or IG encoding sequences, whereas the V and J primers may amplify products only from genomes with a rearranged VDJ region. The ratio between these two classes of amplification product molecules permits estimation of the total number of B cell genomes in the sample.

The practice of certain embodiments of the present invention will employ, unless indicated specifically to the contrary, conventional methods in microbiology, molecular biology, biochemistry, molecular genetics, cell biology, virology and immunology techniques that are within the skill of the art, and reference to several of which is made below for the purpose of illustration. Such techniques are explained fully in the literature. See, e.g., Sambrook, et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (3^(rd) Edition, 2001); Sambrook, et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (2^(nd) Edition, 1989); Maniatis et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (1982); Ausubel et al., Current Protocols in Molecular Biology (John Wiley and Sons, updated July 2008); Short Protocols in Molecular Biology: A Compendium of Methods from Current Protocols in Molecular Biology, Greene Pub. Associates and Wiley-Interscience; Glover, DNA Cloning: A Practical Approach, vol. I & II (IRL Press, Oxford Univ. Press USA, 1985); Current Protocols in Immunology (Edited by: John E. Coligan, Ada M. Kruisbeek, David H. Margulies, Ethan M. Shevach, Warren Strober 2001 John Wiley & Sons, NY, NY); Real-Time PCR: Current Technology and Applications, Edited by Julie Logan, Kirstin Edwards and Nick Saunders, 2009, Caister Academic Press, Norfolk, UK; Anand, Techniques for the Analysis of Complex Genomes, (Academic Press, New York, 1992); Guthrie and Fink, Guide to Yeast Genetics and Molecular Biology (Academic Press, New York, 1991); Oligonucleotide Synthesis (N. Gait, Ed., 1984); Nucleic Acid Hybridization (B. Hames & S. Higgins, Eds., 1985); Transcription and Translation (B. Hames & S. Higgins, Eds., 1984); Animal Cell Culture (R. Freshney, Ed., 1986); Perbal, A Practical Guide to Molecular Cloning (1984); Next-Generation Genome Sequencing (Janitz, 2008 Wiley-VCH); PCR Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Park, Ed., 3^(rd) Edition, 2010 Humana Press); Immobilized Cells And Enzymes (IRL Press, 1986); the treatise, Methods In Enzymology (Academic Press, Inc., N.Y.); Gene Transfer Vectors For Mammalian Cells (J. H. Miller and M. P. Calos eds., 1987, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory); Harlow and Lane, Antibodies, (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y., 1998); Immunochemical Methods In Cell And Molecular Biology (Mayer and Walker, eds., Academic Press, London, 1987); Handbook Of Experimental Immunology, Volumes I-IV (D. M. Weir and CC Blackwell, eds., 1986); Riott, Essential Immunology, 6th Edition, (Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 1988); Embryonic Stem Cells: Methods and Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Kurstad Turksen, Ed., 2002); Embryonic Stem Cell Protocols: Volume I: Isolation and Characterization (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Kurstad Turksen, Ed., 2006); Embryonic Stem Cell Protocols: Volume II: Differentiation Models (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Kurstad Turksen, Ed., 2006); Human Embryonic Stem Cell Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Kursad Turksen Ed., 2006); Mesenchymal Stem Cells: Methods and Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Darwin J. Prockop, Donald G. Phinney, and Bruce A. Bunnell Eds., 2008); Hematopoietic Stem Cell Protocols (Methods in Molecular Medicine) (Christopher A. Klug, and Craig T. Jordan Eds., 2001); Hematopoietic Stem Cell Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Kevin D. Bunting Ed., 2008) Neural Stem Cells: Methods and Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Leslie P. Weiner Ed., 2008).

Unless specific definitions are provided, the nomenclature utilized in connection with, and the laboratory procedures and techniques of, molecular biology, analytical chemistry, synthetic organic chemistry, and medicinal and pharmaceutical chemistry described herein are those well known and commonly used in the art. Standard techniques may be used for recombinant technology, molecular biological, microbiological, chemical syntheses, chemical analyses, pharmaceutical preparation, formulation, and delivery, and treatment of patients.

Unless the context requires otherwise, throughout the present specification and claims, the word “comprise” and variations thereof, such as, “comprises” and “comprising” are to be construed in an open, inclusive sense, that is, as “including, but not limited to”. By “consisting of” is meant including, and typically limited to, whatever follows the phrase “consisting of” By “consisting essentially of” is meant including any elements listed after the phrase, and limited to other elements that do not interfere with or contribute to the activity or action specified in the disclosure for the listed elements. Thus, the phrase “consisting essentially of” indicates that the listed elements are required or mandatory, but that no other elements are required and may or may not be present depending upon whether or not they affect the activity or action of the listed elements.

In this specification and the appended claims, the singular forms “a,” “an” and “the” include plural references unless the content clearly dictates otherwise. As used herein, in particular embodiments, the terms “about” or “approximately” when preceding a numerical value indicates the value plus or minus a range of 5%, 6%, 7%, 8% or 9%. In other embodiments, the terms “about” or “approximately” when preceding a numerical value indicates the value plus or minus a range of 10%, 11%, 12%, 13% or 14%. In yet other embodiments, the terms “about” or “approximately” when preceding a numerical value indicates the value plus or minus a range of 15%, 16%, 17%, 18%, 19% or 20%.

Reference throughout this specification to “one embodiment” or “an embodiment” or “an aspect” means that a particular feature, structure or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the present invention. Thus, the appearances of the phrases “in one embodiment” or “in an embodiment” in various places throughout this specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment. Furthermore, the particular features, structures, or characteristics may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments.

EXAMPLES Example 1 Design of Template Oligonucleotides for Calibrating Amplification Primer Bias Control

In this and the following Examples, standard molecular biology and biochemistry materials and methodologies were employed, including techniques described in, e.g., Sambrook, et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (3^(rd) Edition, 2001); Sambrook, et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (2^(nd) Edition, 1989); Maniatis et al., Molecular Cloning: A Laboratory Manual (1982); Ausubel et al., Current Protocols in Molecular Biology (John Wiley and Sons, updated July 2008); Short Protocols in Molecular Biology: A Compendium of Methods from Current Protocols in Molecular Biology, Greene Pub. Associates and Wiley-Interscience; Glover, DNA Cloning: A Practical Approach, vol. I & II (IRL Press, Oxford Univ. Press USA, 1985); Anand, Techniques for the Analysis of Complex Genomes, (Academic Press, New York, 1992); Oligonucleotide Synthesis (N. Gait, Ed., 1984); Nucleic Acid Hybridization (B. Hames & S. Higgins, Eds., 1985); Transcription and Translation (B. Hames & S. Higgins, Eds., 1984); Perbal, A Practical Guide to Molecular Cloning (1984); Next-Generation Genome Sequencing (Janitz, 2008 Wiley-VCH); PCR Protocols (Methods in Molecular Biology) (Park, Ed., 3^(rd) Edition, 2010 Humana Press).

A set of double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) template oligonucleotides was designed as a calibration standard for use as a control template that simulated all possible V/J combinations at a specified adaptive immune receptor (TCR or BCR) locus. For each human TCR and BCR locus, a list was compiled of the known genomic V segment sequences 5′ of the RSS, and a list of the known genomic J segments 3′ of the RSS. The coding strand sequences of the dsDNA template are presented here for ease of interpretation, according to the convention by which the 5′-to-3′ orientation is read left-to-right.

A schematic representation of the general structure of the template oligonucleotides is shown in FIG. 1. For use in cross-validation of each unique template oligonucleotide's identity in multiple contexts, a different 16 bp barcode oligonucleotide (B) was incorporated into each template that uniquely identified the V segment polynucleotide of the template with the first 8 bp of the barcode, and the J segment with the second 8 bp of the barcode. Copies of this barcode were incorporated thrice: (B3) between the external adapter (U2) and the J segment sequence (J) so that a short single-end read with standard Illumina or Ion primers can reveal the identity of the unique combination of V and J sequences in each template oligonucleotide, (B2) between the V and J segments so that a standard sequencing strategy (e.g., Illumina GA-2 or HiSeq™ or MiSEQ®) will capture the unique combination of V and J sequences in each template oligonucleotide, and (B3) between the V segment and the other external adapter (U1), so that a short paired-end read can confirm the identity of the unique combination of V and J sequences in each template oligonucleotide if so desired.

As shown in FIG. 1, the template oligonucleotide sequences started with an adapter sequence (U1) that was capable of incorporating sequencing platform-specific short oligonucleotide sequences at the ends of the molecule. In this example the Illumina Nextera™ adaptors were used, but it should be noted that essentially any pair of robust PCR primers would work equally well. As an exemplary adapter, the oligonucleotide sequence GCCTTGCCAGCCCGCTCAG [SEQ ID NO:1746] was attached at the V segment end of U1 (FIG. 1), in order to maintain compatibility with the Nextera™ Illumina Adaptor (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) (CAAGCAGAAGACGGCATACGAGATCGGTCTGCCTTGCCAGCCCGCTCAG) [SEQ ID NO:1747] to add on the standard Illumina oligonucleotide, which was compatible with either single or paired end Illumina sequencing flowcells.

Immediately downstream from (3′ to) U1 was the first copy (B1) of the barcode oligonucleotide ACACACGTGACACTCT [SEQ ID NO:1748]. Next, a fixed length of V segment sequence was incorporated into the template oligonucleotide, with all templates in the template set ending a given number of bases before the natural RSS, in order to mimic a natural TCR or BCR gene rearrangement having a fixed number of bases deleted at the V segment. In this example zero bases were initially deleted before the RSS. To maximize the recognizability of these sequences, all V segment polynucleotide sequences were then trimmed to remove partial codons adjacent to the RSS, so that the residual V segment sequences were in frame with the start codon. Diverse V segment sequences were those shown in the exemplary template oligonucleotide sets presented in the Sequence Listing (e.g., a set of TCRB V segments within the formula (I) sequences of the TCRB template oligonucleotide set in SEQ ID NOS:1-871; a distinct set of TCRB V segments within the formula (I) sequences of the TCRB template oligonucleotide set in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560; a set of TCRG V segments within the formula (I) sequences of the TCRG template oligonucleotide set in SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630); a single exemplary V polynucleotide was as follows:

[SEQ ID NO: 1749] TCTTATTTTCATAGGCTCCATGGATACTGGAATTACCCAGACACCAAAA TACCTGGTCACAGCAATGGGGAGTAAAAGGACAATGAAACGTGAGCATC TGGGACATGATTCTATGTATTGGTACAGACAGAAAGCTAAGAAATCCCT GGAGTTCATGTTTTACTACAACTGTAAGGAATTCATTGAAAACAAGACT GTGCCAAATCACTTCACACCTGAATGCCCTGACAGCTCTCGCTTATACC TTCATGTGGTCGCACTGCAGCAAGAAGACTCAGCTGCGTATCTCTGCAC CAGCAG.

The stop codon TGA was incorporated in-frame at the 3′ end of the V polynucleotide sequence in each template oligonucleotide, to ensure that the template oligonucleotide sequences would not be considered relevant in the event they contaminated a biological sample. Downstream from the stop codon, between the V segment and J segment where the NDN would normally be, the second copy of the V/J identifier barcode sequence B2 (SEQ ID NO:1748) was inserted. Next the Sal1 restriction enzyme recognition site (R) sequence GTCGAC was incorporated; this sequence was selected on the basis of being a sequence that was not naturally present in any of the TCRB V or J segment genomic sequences, conferring the ability to specifically destroy the synthetic template if desired, or for use as an informatic marker to identify the synthetic sequences. The B3 site, in this version of the template is empty.

The J polynucleotide (J) was incorporated as a fixed length of sequence from a J gene segment, measured from a fixed number of bases after the natural RSS to mimic a natural rearrangement, and in the present example extending into the J-C intron. In this example zero bases were deleted bases from the J segment, but in other template oligonucleotide designs a deletion of 5 bp was used to make room for the VJ barcode (B2) at the V-J junction while maintaining an overall J segment length in the natural range. An exemplary J polynucleotide was

[SEQ ID NO: 1750] ACTGAAGCTTTCTTTGGACAAGGCACCAGACTCACAGTTGTAGGTAAG ACATTTTTCAGGTTCTTTTGCAGATCCGTCACAGGGAAAAGTGGGTCC ACAG.

Downstream from the J segment polynucleotide was the third copy (B4) of the V/J barcode identifier oligonucleotide (SEQ ID NO:1748). The exemplary template oligonucleotide sequence the sequence ended with a second adapter sequence (U2) that was capable of incorporating platform-specific sequences at the ends of the molecule. As noted above, a Nextera™-compatible adaptor (CTGATGGCGCGAGGGAGGC) [SEQ ID NO:1751] was used on the J segment end of U2, for use with the Nextera™ Illumina Adaptor (AATGATACGGCGACCACCGAGATCTACACGCCTCCCTCGCGCCATCAG) [SEQ ID NO:1752] to permit adding on the standard Illumina sequencing oligonucleotide, which is compatible with either single or paired end flowcells.

Exemplary TCRB and TCRG template oligonucleotide sets according to the present disclosure were prepared and had the nucleotide sequences set forth in SEQ ID NOS:1-1630. The sets of template oligonucleotides having sequences set forth in SEQ ID NOS:1-871 and 1561-1630 were custom synthesized, based on the sequence design information disclosed herein, by Integrated DNA Technologies, Inc. (Coralville, Iowa) using gBlocks™ Gene Fragments chemistry. The set of template oligonucleotides having sequences set forth in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560 was generated by a PCR tiling approach described in Example 2.

TCRB Template Oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:1-871).

A set of 871 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) (in which B3 is nothing) was designed using human TCRB V and J polynucleotide sequences:

5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-(B3)-J-B4-U2-3′  (I).

Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 495 base pair DNA molecule. Sense strand sequences are presented as SEQ ID NOS:1-871.

A schematic diagram depicting the design of this template set is shown in FIG. 1. By convention, the diagram depicts the oligonucleotide design in the 5′-to ′3′ (left-to-right) direction. “V segment” represents an adaptive immune receptor variable (V) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof “J segment” represents an adaptive immune receptor joining (J) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof. U1 and U2 represent, respectively, first and second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequences, which may optionally further comprise, respectively, first and second sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences linked to and positioned 5′ to the first and second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequences. B1, B2 and B4 represent oligonucleotide barcode sequences that each comprise an oligonucleotide barcode sequence comprising a unique oligonucleotide sequence that uniquely identifies, as a paired combination, (i) a unique V segment sequence, and (ii) a unique J segment sequence; in this Example, B3 was nothing.

S represents an optional stop codon that may be in-frame or out of frame at the 3′ end of V. R represents an optional restriction enzyme recognition site. In SEQ ID NOS:1-871 the U1 and U2 adapters included the 19-mers as described above (SEQ ID NOS:1746 and 1751, respectively) and all (V+J)-identifying barcode (B) sequences (B1, B2, B4) were 16 nucleotides in length; the stop codon TGA and the Sal1 restriction enzyme recognition site (GTCGAC) were included.

TCRB Template Oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:872-1560).

A second set of 689 template oligonucleotides was designed in which, according to general formula (I), V and J comprised, respectively, human TCRB V and J polynucleotide sequences, U1 and U2 independently comprised distinct restriction enzyme recognition sites (R1 and R3), and B1, B3, and B4 were independently nothing, to arrive at general formula (II):

R1-V-B2-R2-J-R3  (II)

wherein B2 was an 8-nucleotide barcode identifier (e.g., a barcode sequence as set forth in Table 7); R1, R2 and R3 were, respectively, the restriction enzyme recognition sites EcoR1 (GAATTC), Sal1 (GTCGAC) and Sph1 (GCATGC); and V and J were, respectively, V region and J region polynucleotides as described herein. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 239 base pair DNA molecule. Sense strand sequences are presented as SEQ ID NOS:872-1560.

TCRG Template Oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630).

A third set of 70 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was designed using human TCRG V and J polynucleotide sequences. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 495 base pair DNA molecule. Sense strand sequences are presented as SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630. Details for the 70-oligonucleotide set of TCRG templates (SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630) are representative and were as follows:

Based on previously determined genomic sequences the human TCRG locus was shown to contain 14 Vγ segments that each had a RSS sequence and were therefore regarded as rearrangement-competent. These 14 Vγ segments included six gene segments known to be expressed, three V segments that were classified as having open reading frames, and five V pseudogenes. The Vγ gene segments were linked to five Jγ gene segments. In order to include all possible V+J gene combinations for the 14 V and 5 J segments, 70 (5×14) templates were designed that represented all possible VJ combinations. Each template conformed to the general formula (I) (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-(B3)-J-B4-U2-3′) (FIG. 1) and thus included nine sections, a 19 base pair (bp) universal adapter (U1), a 16 bp nucleotide tag uniquely identifying each paired combination of V gene and J gene segments (B1), 300 bp of V gene specific sequence (V), a 3 bp stop codon (S), another copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B2), a 6 bp junction tag shared by all molecules (R), nothing for B3, 100 bp of J gene specific sequence (J), a third copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B4), and a 19 bp universal adapter sequence (U2).

Each of the 70 templates (SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630) was amplified individually using oligonucleotide primers (Table 4; SEQ ID NOS:1732-1745) designed to anneal to the universal adapter sequences (U1, U2).

TABLE 4 TCRG Amplification Primers 5′ SEQ ID Primer Name Adapter Sequence NO: TCRGV01_dev10 pGEXf GGAGGGGAAGGCCCCACAGTGTCTTC 1732 TCRGV02/3/4/5/8_ pGEXf GGAGGGGAAGGCCCCACAGCGTCTTC 1733 dev10 TCRGV05P_dev10 pGEXf GGAGGGGAAGACCCCACAGCATCTTC 1734 TCRGV06_dev10 pGEXf GGAGGGGAAGGCCCCACAGCATCTTC 1735 TCRGV07_dev10 pGEXf GGCGGGGAAGGCCCCACAGCATCTTC 1736 TCRGV09_dev10 pGEXf TGAAGTCATACAGTTCCTGGTGTCCAT 1737 TCRGV10_dev10 pGEXf CCAAATCAGGCTTTGGAGCACCTGATCT 1738 TCRGV11_dev10 pGEXf CAAAGGCTTAGAATATTTATTACATGT 1739 TCRGVA_dev10 pGEXf CCAGGTCCCTGAGGCACTCCACCAGCT 1740 TCRGVB_dev10 pGEXf CTGAATCTAAATTATGAGCCATCTGACA 1741 TCRGJP1_dev10 pGEXr GTGAAGTTACTATGAGCTTAGTCCCTTC 1742 AGCAAA TCRGJP2_dev10 pGEXr CGAAGTTACTATGAGCCTAGTCCCTTTT 1743 GCAAA TCRGJ1/2_dev10 pGEXr TGACAACAAGTGTTGTTCCACTGCCAAA 1744 TCRGJP_dev10 pGEXr CTGTAATGATAAGCTTTGTTCCGGGACC 1745 AAA

The resulting concentration of each amplified template oligonucleotide product was quantified using a LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions. The frequencies of occurrence for each of the 70 possible V-J combinations, as determined by sequencing barcodes B1, are shown in Table 5. The 70 amplified template oligonucleotide preparations were normalized to a standard concentration and then pooled.

To verify that all 70 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina HiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. Briefly, to incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina Nextera™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 60 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina HiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 70 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately 1.4% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (0.14-14%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 70 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were not evenly represented.

Accordingly, adjustment of the concentrations of individual template oligonucleotides and reiteration of the quantitative sequencing steps are conducted until each molecule is present within the threshold tolerance concentration (0.14-14%).

TABLE 5 Relative Representation (number of occurrences of indicated V-J combination) of amplification products of each TCRG VJ pair (14 V × 5 J) in pre-amplification Template Pool Count of Jseg B Labels TCRGJ TCRGJ2 TCRGJP TCRGJP1 TCRGJP2 #N/A GrandTotal TCRGV01 17 308 1315 741 822 44 3247 TCRGV02 630 781 2394 2009 122 65 6001 TCRGV03 250 166 2119 157 1105 51 3848 TCRGV04 777 37 2031 1490 1443 76 5854 TCRGV05 323 93 2571 716 150 63 3916 TCRGV05P 294 1161 2946 1552 530 111 6594 TCRGV06 164 1280 1809 401 23 40 3717 TCRGV07 16 234 1849 1697 93 78 3967 TCRGV08 2523 653 944 170 134 57 4481 TCRGV09 55 1004 2057 124 228 42 3510 TCRGV10 351 690 814 384 466 36 2741 TCRGV11 505 648 639 330 181 39 2342 TCRGVA 199 475 112 272 437 12 1507 TCRGVB 210 20 423 874 917 24 2468 #N/A 77 118 309 150 106 531 1291 Grand Total 6391 7668 22332 11067 6757 1269 55484

Example 2 Detection of TCRB V Gene Amplification Bias

This example describes how a set of 689 human TCRB template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was assembled by tiling together four single stranded oligonucleotides of 50-90 nucleotides each to generate a template set containing hybridization targets for all possible V-J combinations in a set of oligonucleotide primers that was capable of amplifying human TCRB sequences. The set of template oligonucleotides was then used to characterize the relative amplification efficiencies of a set of TCRB V and J amplification primers.

A set of TCRB 689 template oligonucleotides containing polynucleotide sequences representing all possible productively rearranged V and J combinations for human TCRB chains was synthesized by “tiling” together four single-stranded DNA primers in a standard PCR reaction. Briefly, two 90 bp fragments (one in “forward” orientation and the other in “reverse”) were designed for each TCRB V gene segment, one 90 bp fragment (in “reverse” orientation) was designed for each TCRB J gene segment, and a 50 bp (forward) linker molecule was designed to link together the V and J gene fragments. In total, 52 V forward and 52 V reverse, 13 J reverse, and 689 linker molecules were designed. The two 90 bp fragments (one forward, one reverse) that corresponded to each of the V gene segments had 39 bp of complementary overlapping sequence. One end of each V reverse fragment had 25 bp of complementary sequence which overlapped with the 50 bp linker molecule. The remaining 25 bp in each of the linker molecules was a sequence that complementarily overlapped with one end of the J molecule. The molecules were designed so that the complementary sequences would anneal to one another and form double stranded DNA to which Taq polymerase could bind and enzymatically extend the molecule.

Each PCR reaction to assemble the tiled molecules used QIAGEN Multiplex PCR master mix (QIAGEN part number 206145, Qiagen, Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and the four single-stranded oligonucleotide sequences (two TCRB V, a TCRB J and a linker, as described above). The two external molecules (one V forward and one J reverse) were added at a final concentration of 1 μM each while the two internal molecules, (one V reverse and the forward linker), were each added at a final concentration of 0.01 μM. The thermocycler conditions were: 95° C. for 15 minutes, followed by 35 cycles of 94° C. for 30 seconds, 59° C. for 30 seconds, and 72° C. for 1 minute, followed by 1 cycle at 72° C. for 10 minutes. After synthesis, the molecules were quantified by the LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions and the concentration (in ng/μl) of each resulting band was calculated using Caliper LabChip GX software.

The nucleotide sequences for the resulting set of 689 TCRB template oligonucleotides are set forth in SEQ ID NOS:872-1560. In SEQ ID NOS:872-1560, each distinct V region sequence was identified by a unique barcode sequence of eight nucleotides, as shown in Table 7. All 689 templates were normalized to a standard concentration of 25 ng/μl, and then pooled. The resulting pool was used for the TCRB assays described herein to detect biased (non-uniform) utilization of TCRB amplification primers during amplification of the 689-template oligonucleotide set (SEQ ID NOS:872-1560).

Each of the 689 templates was present in the template oligonucleotide pool at experimentally as close as possible to equal molar concentration, and the pool was used as template for the TCRB amplification PCR reaction using an equimolar mixture of 52 TCRB V region primers that included an Illumina adapter-compatible sequence (SEQ ID NOS:1753-1804, Table 6) and an equimolar mix of 13 TCRB J region primers (SEQ ID NOS:1631-1643, Table 1). The members of the pool of 689 templates were amplified using an equimolar pool of the 52 TCRB VβF (forward) primers (the “VF pool”) and an equimolar pool of the 13 TCRB JβR (reverse) primers (the “JR pool”) as shown in Table 1 (SEQ ID NOS:1.631-1695). Polymerase chain reactions (PCR) (50 μL each) were set up at 1.0 μM VF pool (22 nM for each unique TCRB VβF primer), 1.0 μM JR pool (77 nM for each unique TCRB JβR primer), 1 μM QIAGEN Multiplex PCR master mix (QIAGEN part number 206145, Qiagen Corp., Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and 16 ng/μL genomic DNA (gDNA). The following thermal cycling conditions were used in a C100 thermal cycler (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, Calif., USA): one cycle at 95° C. for 15 minutes, 25 to 40 cycles at 94° C. for 30 seconds, 59° C. for 30 seconds, and 72° C. for one minute, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 10 minutes. To sample millions of rearranged TCRβ CDR3 loci, 12 to 20 wells of PCR were performed for each library. As noted above, the V and J primers included a tail that corresponded to, and was compatible with, Illumina adapters for sequencing.

Amplification products were quantitatively sequenced on an Illumina HiSeq™ sequencer. A 60-base pair region of each product molecule was sequenced using standard J sequencing primers (Table 3) starting from the J molecules. The frequencies of occurrence of each TCRB sequence in the reaction products are shown in FIG. 2, from which it was apparent that not all TCRB sequences had been amplified to a comparable degree.

TABLE 6 TCRB Amplification Primers Adjusted  Relative Primer Molar Primer Name Primer Sequence Ratio SEQ ID NO: TRB2V10-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.77 1753 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAA CAA AGG AGA AGT CTC AGA TGG CTA CAG  TRB2V10-2 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.57 1754 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGA TAA AGG AGA AGT CCC CGA TGG CTA TGT  TRB2V10-3 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 2.76 1755 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGA CAA AGG AGA AGT CTC AGA TGG CTA TAG TRB2V11-123 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.88 1756 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT AAG GAT CGA TTT TCT GCA GAG AGG CTC  TRB2V12-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1757 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTT GAT TCT CAG CAC AGA TGC CTG ATG T TRB2V12-2 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1758 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGC GAT TCT CAG CTG AGA GGC CTG ATG G TRB2V12-3/4 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.24 1759 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC GAT TCT CAG CTA AGA TGC CTA ATG C TRB2V12-5 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.82 1760 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTT CTC AGC AGA GAT GCC TGA TGC AAC TTT A TRB2V13 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 2.14 1761 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT GAT CGA TTC TCA GCT CAA CAG TTC AGT  TRB2V14 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.65 1762 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC TTA GCT GAA AGG ACT GGA GGG ACG TAT TRB2V15 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.77 1763 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGC CGA ACA CTT CTT TCT GCT TTC TTG AC  TRB2V16 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.40 1764 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTT CAG CTA AGT GCC TCC CAA ATT CAC CCT  TRB2V17 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 2.87 1765 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAT TCA CAG CTG AAA GAC CTA ACG GAA CGT  TRB2V18 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.80 1766 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAT TTT CTG CTG AAT TTC CCA AAG AGG GCC TRB2V19 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.84 1767 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTA TAG CTG AAG GGT ACA GCG TCT CTC GGG  TRB2V2 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.02 1768 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTT CGA TGA TCA ATT CTC AGT TGA AAG GCC  TRB2V20-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.66 1769 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAT GCA AGC CTG ACC TTG TCC ACT CTG ACA  TRB2V23-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1770 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGA TTC TCA TCT CAA TGC CCC AAG AAC GC  TRB2V24-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 4.01 1771 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAT CTC TGA TGG ATA CAG TGT CTC TCG ACA TRB2V25-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.29 1772 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTT TCC TCT GAG TCA ACA GTC TCC AGA ATA  TRB2V26 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1773 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT CTG AGA GGT ATC ATG TTT CTT GAA ATA  TRB2V27 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 4.22 1774 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC CTG AAG GGT ACA AAG TCT CTC GAA AAG  TRB2V28 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 2.37 1775 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC CTG AGG GGT ACA GTG TCT CTA GAG AGA  TRB2V29-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.50 1776 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCA TCA GCC GCC CAA ACC TAA CAT TCT CAA  TRB2V2P CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1777 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCC TGA ATG CCC TGA CAG CTC TCG CTT ATA  TRB2V3-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.35 1778 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCC TAA ATC TCC AGA CAA AGC TCA CTT AAA  TRB2V3-2 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1 1779 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT CAC CTG ACT CTC CAG ACA AAG CTC AT  TRB2V30 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.48 1780 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGA CCC CAG GAC CGG CAG TTC ATC CTG AGT  TRB2V4-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.32 1781 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT GAA TGC CCC AAC AGC TCT CTC TTA AAC  TRB2V4-2/3 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.11 1782 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT GAA TGC CCC AAC AGC TCT CAC TTA TTC  TRB2V5-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.27 1783 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTG GTC GAT TCT CAG GGC GCC AGT TCT CTA  TRB2V5-3 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.75 1784 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTA ATC GAT TCT CAG GGC GCC AGT TCC ATG  TRB2V5-4 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.58 1785 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC CTA GAT TCT CAG GTC TCC AGT TCC CTA  TRB2V5-5 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.99 1786 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAA GAG GAA ACT TCC CTG ATC GAT TCT CAG C TRB2V5-6 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.69 1787 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGG CAA CTT CCC TGA TCG ATT CTC AGG TCA  TRB2V5-8 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.30 1788 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGG AAA CTT CCC TCC TAG ATT TTC AGG TCG  TRB2V6-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.74 1789 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGT CCC CAA TGG CTA CAA TGT CTC CAG ATT  TRB2V6-2/3 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.59 1790 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGC CAA AGG AGA GGT CCC TGA TGG CTA CAA  TRB2V6-4 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.48 1791 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGT CCC TGA TGG TTA TAG TGT CTC CAG AGC  TRB2V6-5 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.45 1792 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAA GGA GAA GTC CCC AAT GGC TAC AAT GTC  TRB2V6-6 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.41 1793 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGA CAA AGG AGA AGT CCC GAA TGG CTA CAA C TRB2V6-7 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 2.23 1794 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGT TCC CAA TGG CTA CAA TGT CTC CAG ATC  TRB2V6-8 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.18 1795 GCT CTT CCG ATC TCT CTA GAT TAA ACA CAG AGG ATT TCC CAC TRB2V6-9 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.96 1796 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAA GGA GAA GTC CCC GAT GGC TAC AAT GTA TRB2V7-1 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.85 1797 GCT CTT CCG ATC TTC CCC GTG ATC GGT TCT CTG CAC AGA GGT TRB2V7-2 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.64 1798 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAG TGA TCG CTT CTC TGC AGA GAG GAC TGG TRB2V7-3 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.84 1799 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGG CTG CCC AAC GAT CGG TTC TTT GCA GT  TRB2V7-4 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.48 1800 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGG CGG CCC AGT GGT CGG TTC TCT GCA GAG TRB2V7-6/7 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.01 1801 GCT CTT CCG ATC TAT GAT CGG TTC TCT GCA GAG AGG CCT GAG G TRB2V7-8 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 1.57 1802 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGC TGC CCA GTG ATC GCT TCT TTG CAG AAA TRB2V7-9 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 0.49 1803 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGG TTC TCT GCA GAG AGG CCT AAG GGA TCT TRB2V9 CAA GCA GAA GAC GGC ATA CGA 3.46 1804 GCT CTT CCG ATC TGT TCC CTG ACT TGC ACT CTG AAC TAA AC

TABLE 7 Barcode sequences used to identify TCRB V  Regions in SEQ ID NOS: 872-1560 TCRBV region name Nucleotide of 8 bp barcode Sequence SEQ ID NO TCRBV2_8bpBC CAAGGTCA SEQ ID NO: 6375 TCRBV3-1_8bpBC TACGTACG SEQ ID NO: 6376 TCRBV4-1_8bpBC TACGCGTT SEQ ID NO: 6377 TCRBV4-2_8bpBC CTCAGTGA SEQ ID NO: 6378 TCRBV4-3_8bpBC GTGTCTAC SEQ ID NO: 6379 TCRBV5-1_8bpBC AGTACCGA SEQ ID NO: 6380 TCRBV5-3_8bpBC TTGCCTCA SEQ ID NO: 6381 TCRBV5-4_8bpBC TCGTTAGC SEQ ID NO: 6382 TCRBV5-5_8bpBC TGGACATG SEQ ID NO: 6383 TCRBV5-6_8bpBC AGGTTGCT SEQ ID NO: 6384 TCRBV5-7_8bpBC GTACAGTG SEQ ID NO: 6385 TCRBV5-8_8bpBC ATCCATGG SEQ ID NO: 6386 TCRBV6-1_8bpBC TGATGCGA SEQ ID NO: 6387 TCRBV6-2_8bpBC GTAGCAGT SEQ ID NO: 6388 TCRBV6-3_8bpBC GGATCATC SEQ ID NO: 6389 TCRBV6-4_8bpBC GTGAACGT SEQ ID NO: 6390 TCRBV6-5_8bpBC TGTCATCG SEQ ID NO: 6391 TCRBV6-6_8bpBC AGGCTTGA SEQ ID NO: 6392 TCRBV6-7_8bpBC ACACACGT SEQ ID NO: 6393 TCRBV6-8_8bpBC TCCACAGT SEQ ID NO: 6394 TCRBV6-9_8bpBC CAGTCTGT SEQ ID NO: 6395 TCRBV7-1_8bpBC TCCATGTG SEQ ID NO: 6396 TCRBV7-2_8bpBC TCACTGCA SEQ ID NO: 6397 TCRBV7-3_8bpBC CAAGTCAC SEQ ID NO: 6398 TCRBV7-4_8bpBC TAGACGGA SEQ ID NO: 6399 TCRBV7-6_8bpBC GAGCGATA SEQ ID NO: 6400 TCRBV7-7_8bpBC CTCGAGAA SEQ ID NO: 6401 TCRBV7-8_8bpBC ATGACACC SEQ ID NO: 6402 TCRBV7-9_8bpBC CTTCACGA SEQ ID NO: 6403 TCRBV9_8bpBC CGTAGAGT SEQ ID NO: 6404 TCRBV10-1_8bpBC TCGTCGAT SEQ ID NO: 6405 TCRBV10-2_8bpBC AGCTAGTG SEQ ID NO: 6406 TCRBV10-3_8bpBC TGAGACCT SEQ ID NO: 6407 TCRBV11-1_8bpBC GATGGCTT SEQ ID NO: 6408 TCRBV11-2_8bpBC GCATCTGA SEQ ID NO: 6409 TCRBV11-3_8bpBC GACACTCT SEQ ID NO: 6410 TCRBV12-3_8bpBC TGCTACAC SEQ ID NO: 6411 TCRBV12-4_8bpBC TCAGCTTG SEQ ID NO: 6412 TCRBV12-5_8bpBC TTCGGAAC SEQ ID NO: 6413 TCRBV13_8bpBC GCAATTCG SEQ ID NO: 6414 TCRBV14_8bpBC CAAGAGGT SEQ ID NO: 6415 TCRBV15_8bpBC GAATGGAC SEQ ID NO: 6416 TCRBV16_8bpBC AACTGCCA SEQ ID NO: 6417 TCRBV17p_8bpBC CCTAGTAG SEQ ID NO: 6418 TCRBV18_8bpBC CTGACGTT SEQ ID NO: 6419 TCRBV19_8bpBC TGCAGACA SEQ ID NO: 6420 TCRBV20-1_8bpBC AGTTGACC SEQ ID NO: 6421 TCRBV24-1_8bpBC GTCTCCTA SEQ ID NO: 6422 TCRBV25-1_8bpBC CTGCAATC SEQ ID NO: 6423 TCRBV27-1_8bpBC TGAGCGAA SEQ ID NO: 6424 TCRBV28_8bpBC TTGGACTG SEQ ID NO: 6425 TCRBV29-1_8bpBC AGCAATCC SEQ ID NO: 6426 TCRBV30_8bpBC CGAACTAC SEQ ID NO: 6427

Using the data that were obtained to generate FIG. 2, as described above, the cross-amplification capability (ability to amplify a V gene segment other than the one for which the primer was specifically designed on the basis of annealing sequence complementarity) was assessed for each amplification primer that had been designed to anneal to a specific V gene segment. 52 independent amplification primer pools were prepared, where each primer pool had 51 of the 52 TCRB V region primers of Table 6 pooled at equimolar concentrations, and the 52^(nd) TCRB V region primer present in the pool at twice the molar concentration of the other 51 primers. A separate amplification primer pool was prepared so that there was one pool for each of the 52 V primers in which a single primer was present at twice the concentration of the other primers, resulting in 52 unique primer pools. 52 separate amplification reactions were then set up, one for each of the unique amplification primer pools, with each reaction using the set of 689 template oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:872-1560) described above. Template oligonucleotides were present at equimolar concentration relative to one another. Amplification and sequencing were conducted using the conditions described above. The results are shown in FIG. 3.

In FIG. 3, black squares indicated no change in the degree of amplification with the respective indicated TCRB V region-specific primer present at twice the concentration relative to equimolar concentrations of all other primers; white squares indicated a 10-fold increase in amplification; grey squares indicated intermediate degrees (on a greyscale gradient) of amplification between zero and 10-fold. The diagonal line indicated that doubling the molar concentration for a given primer resulted in about a 10-fold increase in the amplification of the respective template oligonucleotide having the specific annealing target sequence, in the case of most of the TCRB V regions primers that were tested. The off-diagonal white squares indicated non-corresponding templates to which certain primers were able to anneal and amplify.

Where one or more primers exhibited amplification potential that was significantly greater or lower than an acceptable range of amplification potential (e.g., a designated uniform amplification potential range), further adjustment of the concentrations of individual primer oligonucleotides and reiteration of the template amplification and quantitative sequencing steps were conducted, until each species of product molecule was present within a desired range that was indicative of correction of the non-uniform amplification potential among the primers within an amplification primer set.

Accordingly, primer concentrations were adjusted as indicated in Table 6, in order to determine whether biased amplification results that were apparent in FIGS. 2 and 3 could be reduced in severity by increasing or decreasing the relative presence of, respectively, highly efficient or poorly efficient amplification primers. For multiplexed PCR using an adjusted primer set, the V gene primer sequences remained the same (sequence reported in table 6), however the relative concentration of each primer was either increased, if the primer under-amplified its template (FIG. 3), or decreased if the primer over-amplified its template (FIG. 3) The adjusted mixture of amplification primers was then used in a PCR to amplify the template composition containing, in equimolar amounts, the set of 689 template oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:872-1560) that were used to generate the data in FIGS. 2 and 3.

Amplification and quantitative sequencing were performed as described above and the results are shown in FIG. 4, which compares the frequency at which each indicated amplified V region sequence-containing product was obtained when all amplification primers were present at equimolar concentrations (black bars) to the frequency at which each such product was obtained after the concentrations of the amplification primers were adjusted (grey bars) to the concentrations as indicated in Table 6.

Additional hs-TCRB primer sequences are found at SEQ ID NOs. 6192-6264.

Example 3 Correcting Non-Uniform Amplification Potential (PCR Bias) in TCR-Amplifying Oligonucleotide Primer Sets

Diverse TCR amplification primers are designed to amplify every possible combination of rearranged TCR V and J gene segments in a biological sample that contains lymphoid cell DNA from a subject. A preparation containing equimolar concentrations of the diverse amplification primers is used in multiplexed PCR to amplify a diverse template composition that comprises equimolar concentrations of TCR-specific template oligonucleotides according to formula (I) with at least one template representing every possible V-J combination for the TCR locus. The amplification products are quantitatively sequenced and the frequency of occurrence of each unique V-J product sequence is obtained from the frequency of occurrence of each 16 bp molecular barcode sequence (B in formula (I)) that uniquely identifies each V-J combination.

For TCRG, the TCRG template oligonucleotides (SEQ ID NOS:1561-1630) are amplified using TCRG V- and J-specific primers (SEQ ID NOS:1732-1745, Table 4). J primer independence of respectively paired V primers is identified by separately amplifying each of the eight TCRG V gene segment specific primers with a pool of the five J gene segment specific primers. The amplification products are quantitatively sequenced on an Illumina HiSeq™ sequencing platform and the frequency of occurrence of the internal 16 bp barcode sequences (B) that uniquely identify specific V-J combinations permit quantification of each V-J pair. V primer independence of respectively paired J primers is identified by performing the inverse reaction, i.e., by separately amplifying each of the five TCRG J gene segment primers with a pool of the eight V gene segment specific primers.

To test if TCRG V primers or J primers cross-amplify (e.g., whether gene segment specific primers amplify non-specifically, for instance, to test if the V primer specifically designed to amplify TCRG V7 segments is able to amplify both TCRG V6 and TCRG V7 V gene segments), independent primer pools are generated that contain equimolar concentrations of all but one of the primers, and the omitted primer is then added to the pool at twice the molar concentration of all other primers. The primers are then used to amplify a template composition that comprises a plurality of template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) as described herein, using TCRG V and J gene sequences in, respectively, the V and J polynucleotides of formula (I). Quantitative sequencing reveals the identities of any one or more templates that are overrepresented among the amplification products when a single amplification primer is present at twice the concentration of all other primers in the pool of primers. The primer mixture is then adjusted to increase or decrease the relative concentrations of one or more primers, to obtain amplification frequencies in iterative rounds that are within acceptable quantitative tolerances. The adjusted primer mixture so obtained is regarded as having been corrected to reduce non-uniform amplification potential among the members of the primer set.

To determine whether a corrected primer mixture exhibits unbiased amplification potential when used to amplify rearranged TCR template DNA in a biological sample from lymphoid cells of a subject, the artificial template compositions as described herein are prepared with all VJ pairs present at similar frequency, and also with varying ratios of the relative representation of certain VJ pairs. Each type of template preparation is separately tested as an amplification template for an amplification primer set that has been corrected to reduce non-uniform amplification potential among certain members of the primer set. Quantitative sequence determination of amplification products identifies that the relative quantitative representation of specific sequences in the template preparation is reflected in the relative quantitative representation of specific sequences among the amplification products.

As an alternative to the iterative process described above, or in addition to such iterative amplification steps followed by quantitative sequencing, amplification bias can also be corrected computationally. According to this computational approach, the starting frequency of each of the species of template oligonucleotide sequences in the synthesized template composition is known. The frequency of each of these species of oligonucleotide sequences among the amplification products that are obtained following PCR amplification is determined by quantitative sequencing. The difference between the relative frequencies of the template oligonucleotide sequences prior to PCR amplification and their frequencies following PCR amplification is the “PCR bias.” This difference is the amplification bias introduced during amplification, for example, as a consequence of different amplification efficiencies among the various amplification primers.

As quantitatively determined for each known template oligonucleotide sequence, the PCR bias for each primer is used to calculate an amplification bias (normalization) factor by which the observed frequency for each amplification product is corrected to reflect the actual frequency of the respective template sequence in the template composition. If PCR bias for an amplification primer set is empirically detected using the present template composition as being within a factor of 10, then the bias can be computationally corrected in amplification products obtained when the same amplification primer set is used to amplify a DNA sample of unknown composition. Improved accuracy in the quantification of template species in the DNA sample is thereby obtained.

Because V and J primers are empirically tested and shown to be independent, an amplification bias factor can be derived for each V species and for each J species, and an amplification factor for each VJ species pair is not necessary. Accordingly, the amplification bias factor for each V species and J species is derived using the present template composition. By the present method, the frequencies of the V and J gene sequences in the template composition are known (or can be calculated based on knowledge of the concentrations of each template oligonucleotide species in the template composition as synthesized) prior to PCR amplification. After PCR amplification, quantitative sequencing is used to detect the frequency of each V and J gene segment sequence in the amplification products. For each sequence, the difference in gene segment frequency is the amplification bias:

Initial Frequency/final frequency=amplification bias factor

Amplification bias factors are calculated for every V gene segment and every J gene segment. These amplification factors, once calculated, can be applied to samples for which the starting frequency of V and J genes is unknown.

In a mixed template population (such as a complex DNA sample obtained from a biological source that comprises DNA from lymphoid cells that are presumed to contain rearranged adaptive immune receptor encoding DNA, or a complex DNA sample which additionally comprises DNA from other cells lacking such rearrangements), where the starting frequency of each V and J gene segment is unknown, the calculated amplification factors for a primer set that has been characterized using the present template composition can be used to correct for residual PCR amplification bias. For each species of sequenced amplification product molecule, the V and J genes that are used by the molecule are determined based on sequence similarity. To correct for amplification bias, the number of times the molecule was sequenced is multiplied by both the correct V and J amplification factors. The resulting sequence count is the computationally “normalized” set.

Example 4 Generation of Additional Template Compositions

Additional template compositions were designed and produced essentially according to the methodologies described above.

V and J Polynucleotides.

TCRB V and J polynucleotide sequences were generated for inclusion in the herein described plurality of template oligonucleotides and are set forth in sets of 68 TCRB V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as shown in FIGS. 5a-5l as TCRB V/J set 1, TCRB V/J set 2, TCRB V/J set 3, TCRB V/J set 4, TCRB V/J set 5, TCRB V/J set 6, TCRB V/J set 7, TCRB V/J set 8, TCRB V/J set 9, TCRB V/J set 10, TCRB V/J set 11, TCRB V/J set 12 and TCRB V/J set 13.

TCRG V and J polynucleotide sequences were generated for inclusion in the herein described plurality of template oligonucleotides and are set forth in sets of 14 TCRG V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIGS. 6a-6b as TCRG V/J set 1, TCRG V/J set 2, TCRG V/J set 3, TCRG V/J set 4 and TCRG V/J set 5.

IGH V and J polynucleotide sequences were generated for inclusion in the herein described plurality of template oligonucleotides and are set forth in sets of 127 IGH V and J SEQ ID NOS, respectively, as set forth in FIGS. 7a-7m as IGH V/J set 1, IGH V/J set 2, IGH V/J set 3, IGH V/J set 4, IGH V/J set 5, IGH V/J set 6, IGH V/J set 7, IGH V/J set 8 and IGH V/J set 9.

Template Compositions.

A template composition was prepared for standardizing the amplification efficiency of TCRB amplification primer sets. The composition comprised a plurality of template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I). The TCRB template composition comprising 858 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:3157-4014.

A template composition was prepared for standardizing the amplification efficiency of TCRG amplification primer sets. The composition comprised a plurality of template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I). The TCRG template composition comprising 70 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:4015-4084.

A template composition was prepared for standardizing the amplification efficiency of IGH amplification primer sets. The composition comprised a plurality of template oligonucleotides having a plurality of oligonucleotide sequences of general formula (I). The IGH template composition comprising 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:4085-5200. An IGH template composition comprising a set of 1116 template oligonucleotides is also disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:1805-2920.

Example 5 Use of the Template Composition to Determine Amplification Factor

This example describes quantification of rearranged DNA molecules encoding a plurality of IG molecules, using the presently described template oligonucleotide composition as a “spiked-in” synthetic template in a multiplexed PCR amplification of a DNA sample containing B cell and fibroblast DNA.

Biological Template DNA: Eight biological samples were used as sources of template DNA, with each biological sample containing the same amount of total genomic DNA (gDNA), 300 ng, but in a different proportion of (i) DNA extracted from B cells to (ii) DNA extracted from human fibroblast cells, a cell type in which IG and TCR encoding genes do not rearrange. The samples contained 0, 0.07, 0.3, 1, 4, 18, 75 or 300 ng B cell gDNA, with fibroblast gDNA supplying the balance of each 300 ng gDNA preparation. Four replicates of each sample were made.

Synthetic Template DNA: To each PCR reaction (below) were added 5000 molecules (4-5 molecules of each sequence) from an oligonucleotide template composition comprising a pool of 1116 synthetic IGH template oligonucleotide molecules (SEQ ID NOS:4085-5200). An IGH template composition comprising a set of 1116 template oligonucleotides is also disclosed in the Sequence Listing as SEQ ID NOS:1805-2920.

PCR Reaction: The PCR reaction used QIAGEN Multiplex Plus™ PCR master mix (QIAGEN part number 206152, Qiagen, Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and 300 ng of biological template DNA (described above). The pooled amplification primers were added so the final reaction had an aggregate forward primer concentration of 2 μM and an aggregate reverse primer concentration of 2 μM. The forward primers (SEQ ID NOS:5201-5286) included 86 primers that had at the 3′ end an approximately 20 bp segment that annealed to the IGH V segment encoding sequence and at the 5′ end an approximately 20 bp universal primer pGEXf. The reverse primers (SEQ ID NOS:5287-5293) included an aggregate of J segment specific primers that at the 3′ end had an approximately 20 bp segment that annealed to the IGH J segment encoding sequence and at the 5′ end of the J primers was a universal primer pGEXr. The following thermal cycling conditions were used in a C100 thermal cycler (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, Calif., USA): one cycle at 95° C. for 10 minutes, 30 cycles at 94° C. for 30 seconds, 63° C. for 30 seconds, and 72° C. for one minute, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 10 minutes. Each reaction was run in quadruplicates.

For sequencing, Illumina adapters (Illumina Inc., San Diego, Calif.), which also included a 8 bp tag and a 6 bp random set of nucleotides, were incorporated onto the ends of the PCR reaction products in a 7 cycle PCR reaction. The PCR reagents and conditions were as described above, except for the thermocycle conditions, which were: 95° C. for 5 minutes, followed by 7 cycles of 95° for 30 sec, 68° for 90 sec, and 72° for 30 sec. Following thermal cycling, the reactions were held for 10 minutes at 72° and the primers were the Illumina adaptor tailing primers (SEQ ID NOS:5387-5578). Samples were sequenced on an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer using the Illumina PE RD2 primer.

Results:

Sequence data were obtained for each sample and amplification products of synthetic templates were identified by the presence of the barcode oligonucleotide sequence. For each sample, the number of template products was divided by the number of unique synthetic template oligonucleotide sequences (1116) to arrive at a sample amplification factor. The total number of amplification products of the biological templates for each sample was then divided by the amplification factor to calculate the number of rearranged biological template molecules (e.g., VDJ recombinations) in the starting amplification reaction as an estimate of the number of unique B cell genome templates. The average values with standard deviations were plotted against the known number of rearranged biological template molecules based on B cell input (FIG. 9). In FIG. 9, the dots represent the average amplification factor and the bars represent the standard deviation across the four replicates. The use of amplification factors calculated as described herein to estimate the number of VJ-rearranged IG encoding molecules (as a proxy value for the number of B cells) yielded determinations that were consistent with known B cell numbers at least down to an input of 100 B cells. The estimated amplification factor values and the observed amplification factor were highly correlated (FIG. 9, R²=0.9988).

Example 6 IgH, IgL, and IgK Bias Control Templates IgH VJ Template Oligonucleotides

In one embodiment, IgH VJ template oligonucleotides were generated and analyzed. A set of 1134 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was designed using human IgH V and J polynucleotide sequences. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 495 base pair DNA molecule. Details for the 1134-oligonucleotide set of IgH templates are representative and were as follows.

Based on previously determined genomic sequences, the human IgH locus was shown to contain 126 Vh segments that each had a RSS sequence and were therefore regarded as rearrangement-competent. These 126 Vh segments included 52 gene segments known to be expressed, five V segments that were classified as having open reading frames, and 69 V pseudogenes. The Vh gene segments were linked to 9 Jh gene segments. In order to include all possible V+J gene combinations for the 126 V and 9 J segments, 1134 (9×126) templates were designed that represented all possible VJ combinations. Each template conformed to the general formula (I) (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-J-B4-U2-3′) (FIG. 1) and thus included nine sections, a 19 base pair (bp) universal adapter (U1), a 16 bp nucleotide tag uniquely identifying each paired combination of V gene and J gene segments (B1), 300 bp of V gene specific sequence (V), a 3 bp stop codon (S), another copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B2), a 6 bp junction tag shared by all molecules (R), nothing for B3, 100 bp of J gene specific sequence (J), a third copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B4), and a 19 bp universal adapter sequence (U2). Two V segments were nucleotide identical to another two V segments—and thus were not ordered. This reduced the number of included segments from 1134 to 1116. The IGH template composition comprising 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOS:4085-5200.

Each of the 1116 templates was amplified individually using oligonucleotide primers designed to anneal to the universal adapter sequences (U1, U2). These oligonucleotide sequences can be any universal primer. For this application a universal primer coded Nextera was used.

TABLE 8 Universal Primer sequences included in bias control templates Primer Name Primer Sequence SEQ ID NO pGEXF GGGCTGGCAAGCCACGTTTGGTG SEQ ID NO: 6428 pGEXR CCGGGAGCTGCATGTGTCAGAGG SEQ ID NO: 6429

The universal primer sequences can be annealed to any primer sequence disclosed herein. An example of the PCR primers including the universal primer sequence are shown below:

TABLE 9 Example IGH PCR primers with Universal Sequences (Bold and Underlined) Primer Name Primer Sequence SEQ ID NO pGEXf_IGHV(II)- GGGCTGGCAAGCCACGTTTGGTG AGCCCCCAGGGAAGAAGCT SEQ ID 15-1_ver10_01 GAAGTGG NO: 6430 pGEXr_IGHJ1/4/5_ CCGGGAGCTGCATGTGTCAGAGG CACCTGAGGAGACGGTGAC SEQ ID ver10_03 CAGGGT NO: 6431

The resulting concentration of each amplified template oligonucleotide product was quantified using a LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions. The 1116 amplified template oligonucleotide preparations were normalized to a standard concentration and then pooled.

To verify that all 1116 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. To incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately ˜0.09% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (0.009%-0.9%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 1116 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were not evenly represented.

Accordingly, adjustment of the concentrations of individual template oligonucleotides and reiteration of the quantitative sequencing steps are conducted until each molecule is present within the threshold tolerance concentration (0.009-0.9%).

IgH DJ Template Oligonucleotides

In another embodiment, IgH DJ template oligonucleotides were generated and analyzed. A set of 243 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was designed using human IgH D and J polynucleotide sequences. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 382 base pair DNA molecule. The IgH DJ template oligonucleotide sequences are presented in SEQ ID NOs: 5579-5821. Details for the 243-oligonucleotide set of IgH templates are representative and were as follows.

Based on previously determined genomic sequences, the human IgH locus was shown to contain 27 Dh segments. The 27 Dh gene segments were linked to 9 Jh gene segments. To include all possible D+J gene combinations for the 27 D and 9 J segments, 243 (9×27) templates were designed that represented all possible DJ combinations. Each template conformed to the general formula (I) (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-J-B4-U2-3′) (FIG. 1) and thus included nine sections, a 19 base pair (bp) universal adapter (U1), a 16 bp nucleotide tag uniquely identifying each paired combination of D gene and J gene segments (B1). However, for these molecules, the 300 bp of V gene specific sequence (V) was replaced with a segment of 182 bp of D gene specific sequence. This segment included both exonic and intronic nucleotide segments. Like the other molecules, these included a 3 base pair (bp) stop codon (S), another copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B2), a 6 bp junction tag shared by all molecules (R), nothing for B3, 100 bp of J gene specific sequence (J), a third copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B4), and a 19 bp universal adapter sequence (U2).

Each of the 243 templates (SEQ ID NOs: 5579-5821) was amplified individually using oligonucleotide primers designed to anneal to the universal adapter sequences (U1, U2; See Table 8). These oligonucleotide sequences can be any universal primer; for this application a universal primer coded Nextera was used.

An example of the PCR primers with the universal adapter sequences are shown in Table 10.

TABLE 10 Example IgH DJ PCR primers with Universal Sequences (Bold and Underlined) Primer Name Primer Sequence SEQ ID NO pGEXf IGHV GGGCTGGCAAGCCACGTTTGGTG AGCCCCCAGGG SEQ ID NO: 6432 (II)-15- AAGAAGCTGAAGTGG 1_ver10_01 pGEXr_IGHJ1/ CCGGGAGCTGCATGTGTcAGAGG CACCTGAGGAG SEQ ID NO: 6433 4/5_ver10_03 ACGGTGACCAGGGT

The resulting concentration of each amplified template oligonucleotide product was quantified using a LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions. The 243 amplified template oligonucleotide preparations were normalized to a standard concentration and then pooled.

To verify that all 243 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. To incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 243 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately ˜0.4% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (0.04%-4.0%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 243 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were not evenly represented.

Accordingly, adjustment of the concentrations of individual template oligonucleotides and reiteration of the quantitative sequencing steps are conducted until each molecule is present within the threshold tolerance concentration (0.04-4.0%). Following normalization, this set was combined with 1116 IgH VJ bias control set for a pool of 1359 templates.

FIG. 10 shows results for a pre-PCR amplification sequencing count for each of the 1116 IGH VJ bias control molecules and 243 IGH DJ bias control molecules. Individual bias control molecules are along the x-axis. The set includes the 1116 IGH VJ bias control molecules and 243 IGH DJ bias control molecules for a total of 1359 gblocks. The Y axis is the sequence count for each individual gblock. This calculation provides the quantification of the composition of the pre-amplification representation of each VJ pair. This data is used to estimate the change in frequency between the pre-sample and post-PCR amplification sample to calculate the amplification bias introduced by the primers.

IgL VJ Template Oligonucleotides

In another embodiment, IgL VJ template oligonucleotides were generated and analyzed. A set of 245 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was designed using human IgL V and J polynucleotide sequences. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 495 base pair DNA molecule. The IgL template oligonucleotides are presented as SEQ ID NOs: 5822-6066. Details for the 245-oligonucleotide set of IgL templates are representative and were as follows.

Based on previously determined genomic sequences, the human IgL locus was shown to contain 75 VL segments that each had a RSS sequence and were therefore regarded as rearrangement-competent. These 33 VL segments included gene segments known to be expressed, 5 V segments that were classified as having open reading frames, and 37 V pseudogenes. The VL gene segments were linked to five 6 JL gene segments. To include all possible functional and expressed V+J gene combinations for the 33 functional V and 6 J segments, 204 (6×33) templates were designed that represented all possible expressed VJ combinations. In addition, two of the V pseudogenes were questionable; an additional 12 (2×6) VJ templates were designed, resulting in a total of 216. Each template conformed to the general formula (I) (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-J-B4-U2-3′) (FIG. 1) and thus included nine sections, a 19 base pair (bp) universal adapter (U1), a 16 bp nucleotide tag uniquely identifying each paired combination of V gene and J gene segments (B1), 300 bp of V gene specific sequence (V), a 3 bp stop codon (S), another copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B2), a 6 bp junction tag shared by all molecules (R), nothing for B3, 100 bp of J gene specific sequence (J), a third copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B4), and a 19 bp universal adapter sequence (U2).

Each of the 216 templates was amplified individually using oligonucleotide primers designed to anneal to the universal adapter sequences (U1, U2). These oligonucleotide sequences can be any universal primer; for this application, a universal primer coded Nextera was used.

The resulting concentration of each amplified template oligonucleotide product was quantified using a LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions. The 216 amplified template oligonucleotide preparations were normalized to a standard concentration and then pooled.

To verify that all 216 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. To incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 216 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately ˜0.46% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (0.046%-4.6%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 216 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool evenly represented.

IgK VJ Template Oligonucleotides

In one embodiment, IgK VJ template oligonucleotides were generated and analyzed. A set of 560 template oligonucleotides of general formula (I) was designed using human IgK V and J polynucleotide sequences. Each template oligonucleotide consisted of a 495 base pair DNA molecule. Examples of IgK template oligonucleotides are found at SEQ ID NOs: 6067-6191. Details for the 560-oligonucleotide set of IgK templates are representative and were as follows.

Based on previously determined genomic sequences, the human IgK locus was shown to contain 112 Vk segments that each had a RSS sequence and were therefore regarded as rearrangement-competent. These 112 Vk segments included 46 gene segments known to be expressed, 8 V segments that were classified as having open reading frames, and 50 V pseudogenes. For this IgK, only expressed IgK VJ rearrangements were analyzed. Genes classified as pseudogenes and open reading frames were excluded. The Vk gene segments were linked to five Jk gene segments. This left us with 230 VJ gene rearrangements (46×5). To include all possible functional V+J gene combinations for the 46 functional V and 5 J segments, 230 (5×46) templates were designed that represented all possible VJ combinations. Each template conformed to the general formula (I) (5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-J-B4-U2-3′) (FIG. 1) and thus included nine sections, a 19 base pair (bp) universal adapter (U1), a 16 bp nucleotide tag uniquely identifying each paired combination of V gene and J gene segments (B1), 300 bp of V gene specific sequence (V), a 3 bp stop codon (S), another copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B2), a 6 bp junction tag shared by all molecules (R), nothing for B3, 100 bp of J gene specific sequence (J), a third copy of the 16 bp nucleotide tag (B4), and a 19 bp universal adapter sequence (U2).

Each of the 230 templates was amplified individually using oligonucleotide primers designed to anneal to the universal adapter sequences (U1, U2). These oligonucleotide sequences can be any universal primer—for this application a universal primer coded Nextera was used.

The resulting concentration of each amplified template oligonucleotide product was quantified using a LabChip GX™ capillary electrophoresis system (Caliper Life Sciences, Inc., Hopkinton, Mass.) according to the manufacturer's instructions. The 230 amplified template oligonucleotide preparations were normalized to a standard concentration and then pooled.

To verify that all 230 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. Briefly, to incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 230 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately ˜0.4% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (4.0%-0.04%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 230 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were evenly represented.

Example 7 Combined Assays

IgH DJ and IgH VJ Combined Assay

In some embodiments, it is desired to co-amplify and sequence rearranged IgH VDJ CDR3 chains and rearranged IgH DJ chains. To generate a pool of templates to test a combined IgH DJ and IgH VJ assay using the IgH DJ and IgH VJ templates. When pooled, the final pool includes 1116 VJ and 243 DJ templates, resulting in a total of 1359 individual templates. The IgH VJ template composition comprising 1116 distinct template oligonucleotides is disclosed in the Sequence Listing in SEQ ID NOs: 4085-5200. The IgH DJ template oligonucleotide sequences are presented in SEQ ID NOs: 5579-5821.

To verify that all 1359 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. To incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 1359 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately 0.073% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (0.73%-0.0073%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 1359 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were evenly represented.

IgL and IgK Combined Assay

In other embodiments, it is desired to co-amplify and sequence rearranged IgL and IgK rearranged CDR3 chains. To generate a pool of templates to test a combined IgL and IgK assay (the IgL and IgK templates were combined). When pooled, the final pool includes 216 IgL and 230 IgK templates, for a total of 446 individual templates. The IgL template oligonucleotides are presented as SEQ ID NOs: 5822-6066.

To verify that all 446 template oligonucleotides were present at substantially equimolar concentrations, the pool was sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq™ sequencing platform according to the manufacturer's recommendations. Briefly, to incorporate platform-specific oligonucleotide sequences into the pooled template oligonucleotides, tailed primers were designed that annealed to the universal priming sites (U1, U2) and that had Illumina™ adapter sequence tails as the 5′ ends. A seven-cycle PCR reaction was then performed to anneal the Illumina adapters to the template oligonucleotides. The PCR reaction product mixture was then purified using Agencourt® AMPure® XP beads (Beckman Coulter, Inc., Fullerton, Calif.) under the conditions recommended by the manufacturer. The first 29 bp of the PCR reaction products were sequenced using an Illumina MiSEQ™ sequencer (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, Calif.) and analyzed by assessing the frequency of each 16 bp molecular barcode tag (B1).

A substantially equimolar preparation for the set of 446 distinct template oligonucleotides was calculated to contain approximately ˜0.22% of each member of the set, and a threshold tolerance of plus or minus ten-fold frequency (2.2%-0.022%) for all species was desired. The quantitative sequencing revealed that the 446 species of adapter-modified template oligonucleotides within the initial pool were evenly represented.

Example 8 Correcting Non-Uniform Amplification Potential (PCR Bias) in IgH-Amplifying Oligonucleotide Primer Sets

Diverse IgH amplification primers were designed to amplify every possible combination of rearranged IgH V and J gene segments in a biological sample that contains lymphoid cell DNA from a subject. A preparation containing equimolar concentrations of the diverse amplification primers was used in multiplexed PCR to amplify a diverse template composition that comprises equimolar concentrations of IgH-specific template oligonucleotides according to formula (I) with at least one template representing every possible V-J combination for the IgH locus. The amplification products were quantitatively sequenced and the frequency of occurrence of each unique V-J product sequence was obtained from the frequency of occurrence of each 16 bp molecular barcode sequence (B in formula (I)) that uniquely identified each V-J combination.

The multiplex PCR reaction was designed to amplify all possible V and J gene rearrangements of the IgH locus, as annotated by the IMGT collaboration. See Yousfi Monod M, Giudicelli V, Chaume D, Lefranc. MP. IMGT/JunctionAnalysis: the first tool for the analysis of the immunoglobulin and T cell receptor complex V-J and V-D-J JUNCTIONS. Bioinformatics. 2004; 20(suppl 1):i379-i385. The locus included 126 unique V genes; 52 functional genes, 6 putative open reading frames lacking critical amino acids for function and 69 pseudogenes; and 9 J genes, 6 functional and 3 pseudogenes. The target sequence for primer annealing was identical for some V segments, allowing amplification of all 126 V segments with 86 unique forward primers. Similarly, 7 unique reverse primers annealed to all 9 J genes. As a baseline for bias assessment, the pool of 116 templates was amplified using an equimolar pool of the 86 V forward primers (VF; specific to V genes) and an equimolar pool of the 7 J reverse primers (JR; specific to J genes).

Polymerase chain reactions (PCR) (25 μL each) were set up at 2.0 μM VF, 2.0 μM JR pool (Integrated DNA Technologies), 1 μM QIAGEN Multiplex Plus PCR master mix (QIAGEN, Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and 200,000 target molecules from our synthetic IgH repertoire mix. The following thermal cycling conditions were used in a C100 thermal cycler (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, Calif.): one cycle at 95° C. for 6 minutes, 31 cycles at 95° C. for 30 sec, 64° C. for 120 sec, and 72° C. for 90 sec, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 3 minutes. For all experiments, each PCR condition was replicated three times.

Following initial bias assessment, experiments were performed to define all individual primer amplification characteristics. To determine the specificity of VF and JR primers, 86 mixtures were prepared containing a single VF primer with all JR primers, and 7 mixtures containing a single JR primer with all VF primers. These primer sets were used to amplify the synthetic template and sequenced the resulting libraries to measure the specificity of each primer for the targeted V or J gene segments, and to identify instances of off-target priming. Titration experiments were performed using pools of 2-fold and 4-fold concentrations of each individual VF or JF within the context of all other equimolar primers (e.g. 2×-fold IgHV1-01+all other equimolar VF and JR primers) to estimate scaling factors relating primer concentration to observed template frequency.

Primer Mix Optimization

Using the scaling factors derived by titrating primers one at a time, alternative primer mixes were developed in which the primers were combined at uneven concentrations to minimize amplification bias. The revised primer mixes were then used to amplify the template pool and measure the residual amplification bias. This process was reiterated, reducing or increasing each primer concentration appropriately based on whether templates amplified by that primer were over or under-represented in the previous round of results. At each stage of this iterative process, the overall degree of amplification bias was determined by calculating metrics for the dynamic range (max bias/min bias) and sum of squares (SS, calculated on log(bias) values), and iterated the process of adjusting primer concentrations until there was minimal improvement between iterations. To assess the robustness of the final optimized primer mix and scaling factors to deviations from equimolar template input, we used a highly uneven mixture of IgH reference templates to determine the effect on sequencing output. The final mix was substantially better than an equimolar mix.

Example 9 Correcting Non-Uniform Amplification Potential (PCR Bias) in TCRB-Amplifying Oligonucleotide Primer Sets

Diverse TCRB amplification primers were designed to amplify every possible combination of rearranged TCRB V and J gene segments in a biological sample that contains lymphoid cell DNA from a subject. A preparation containing equimolar concentrations of the diverse amplification primers was used in multiplexed PCR to amplify a diverse template composition that comprises equimolar concentrations of TCRB-specific template oligonucleotides according to formula (I) with at least one template representing every possible V-J combination for the TCRB locus. The amplification products were quantitatively sequenced and the frequency of occurrence of each unique V-J product sequence was obtained from the frequency of occurrence of each 16 bp molecular barcode sequence (B in formula (I)) that uniquely identifies each V-J combination.

The multiplex PCR reaction was designed to amplify all possible V and J gene rearrangements of the TCRB locus, as annotated by the IMGT collaboration. See Yousfi Monod M, Giudicelli V, Chaume D, Lefranc. MP. IMGT/JunctionAnalysis: the first tool for the analysis of the immunoglobulin and T cell receptor complex V-J and V-D-J JUNCTIONS. Bioinformatics. 2004; 20(suppl 1):i379-i385. The locus includes 67 unique V genes. The target sequence for primer annealing was identical for some V segments, allowing us to amplify all 67 V segments with 60 unique forward primers. For the J locus, 13 unique reverse primers annealed to 13 J genes. As a baseline for bias assessment, the pool of 868 templates was amplified using an equimolar pool of the 60 V forward primers (VF; specific to V genes) and an equimolar pool of the 13 J reverse primers (JR; specific to J genes). Polymerase chain reactions (PCR) (25 μL each) were set up at 3.0 μM VF, 3.0 μM JR pool (Integrated DNA Technologies), 1 μM SEM QIAGEN Multiplex Plus PCR master mix (QIAGEN, Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and 200,000 target molecules from our synthetic TCRB repertoire mix. The following thermal cycling conditions were used in a C100 thermal cycler (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, Calif.): one cycle at 95° C. for 5 minutes, 31 cycles at 95° C. for 30 sec, 62° C. for 90 sec, and 72° C. for 90 sec, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 3 minutes. For all experiments, each PCR condition was replicated three times.

Following initial bias assessment, experiments were performed to define all individual primer amplification characteristics. To determine the specificity of our VF and JR primers, 60 mixtures were prepared containing a single VF primer with all JR primers, and 13 mixtures containing a single JR primer with all VF primers. These primer sets were used to amplify the synthetic template and sequenced the resulting libraries to measure the specificity of each primer for the targeted V or J gene segments and to identify instances of off-target priming. Titration experiments were performed using pools of 2-fold and 4-fold concentrations of each individual VF or JF within the context of all other equimolar primers (e.g. 2×-fold TCRBV07-6+all other equimolar VF and JR primers) to allow us to estimate scaling factors relating primer concentration to observed template frequency.

Primer Mix Optimization

Using the scaling factors derived by titrating primers one at a time, alternative primer mixes were developed in which the primers were combined at uneven concentrations to minimize amplification bias. The revised primer mixes were then used to amplify the template pool and measure the residual amplification bias. This process was iterated, reducing or increasing each primer concentration appropriately based on whether templates amplified by that primer were over or under-represented in the previous round of results. At each stage of this iterative process, the overall degree of amplification bias was determined by calculating metrics for the dynamic range (max bias/min bias) and sum of squares (SS, calculated on log(bias) values), and iterated the process of adjusting primer concentrations until there was minimal improvement between iterations. The final mix was substantially better than an equimolar mix of primers.

FIG. 11 shows TCRB-primer iterations for synthetic TCRB VJ templates graphed against relative amplification bias. Relative amplification bias was determined for 858 synthetic TCRB VJ templates prior to chemical bias control correction (Equimolar Primers (black)), post chemical correction (Optimized Primers (dark grey)), and post chemical and computational correction (After computational adjustment (light grey)). The equimolar primers had a dynamic range of 264, an interquartile range of 0.841, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 132. The optimized primers had a dynamic range of 147, an interquartile range of 0.581, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 50.7. The corrected primers (after computational adjustment) had a dynamic range of 90.8, an interquartile range of 0.248, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 12.8.

Example 10 Correcting Non-Uniform Amplification Potential (PCR Bias) in a Combined IGH VJ and DJ-Amplifying Oligonucleotide Primer Sets

Diverse IgH amplification primers were designed to amplify every possible combination of rearranged IgH V and J gene segments and IgH D and J gene segments in a biological sample that contained lymphoid cell DNA from a subject. A preparation containing equimolar concentrations of the diverse amplification primers was used in multiplexed PCR to amplify a diverse template composition that comprises equimolar concentrations of IgH-specific template oligonucleotides according to formula (I) with at least one template representing every possible V-J combination for the IgH locus and every possible D-J combination for the IgH locus. The amplification products were quantitatively sequenced and the frequency of occurrence of each unique V-J and D-J product sequence was obtained from the frequency of occurrence of each 16 bp molecular barcode sequence (B in formula (I)) that uniquely identifies each V-J and D-J combination.

The multiplex PCR reaction was designed to amplify all possible V and J gene rearrangements AND D and J gene rearrangements of the IgH locus, as annotated by the IMGT collaboration. The locus included 126 unique V genes; 52 functional genes, 6 putative open reading frames lacking critical amino acids for function and 69 pseudogenes; and 9 J genes, 6 functional and 3 pseudogenes. The locus also included 27 unique D genes. The target sequence for primer annealing was identical for some V segments, allowing amplification of all 126 V segments with 86 unique forward primers. Similarly, 7 unique reverse primers annealed to all 9 J genes. For the D-J assay, primers were designed to anneal to rearranged −DJ stems. During B cell development, both alleles undergo rearrangement between the D and J gene segments, resulting in two −DJ stems. A −DJ stem includes a J gene, one N region, and a D gene. Following DJ rearrangements, one of the two alleles V gene rearranges with the −DJ stem to code for the CDR3 gene region (VnDnJ). To amplify the −DJ stem, 27 unique primers were designed to anneal to each specific D genes in an intronic region upstream of the D gene exon. These segments, while present in −DJ stems. are excised following V to −DJ recombination. However, J primers were not re-designed; the DJ assay used the same J primers as the VJ assay.

As a baseline for bias assessment, the pool of 1359 templates was amplified using an optimized (mix 2-1) pool of the 86 V forward primers (VF; specific to V genes), 27 D forward primers (DF; specific to D genes) and an equimolar pool of the 7 J reverse primers (JR; specific to J genes). Polymerase chain reactions (PCR) (25 μL each) were set up at 1.0 μM VF, 1.0 μM DF, and 2.0 μM JR pool (Integrated DNA Technologies), 1× QIAGEN Multiplex Plus PCR master mix (QIAGEN, Valencia, Calif.), 10% Q-solution (QIAGEN), and 200,000 target molecules from our synthetic IgH VJ and DJ repertoire mix. The following thermal cycling conditions were used in a C100 thermal cycler (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, Calif.): one cycle at 95° C. for 6 minutes, 31 cycles at 95° C. for 30 sec, 64° C. for 120 sec, and 72° C. for 90 sec, followed by one cycle at 72° C. for 3 minutes. For all experiments, each PCR condition was replicated three times.

Following initial bias assessment, experiments were performed to define all individual primer amplification characteristics. To determine the specificity of our DF and JR primers, 27 mixtures were prepared containing a single DF primer with all JR primers and the previously identified optimized VF pool, and 7 mixtures containing a single JR primer with all VF and DF primers. These primer sets were used to amplify the synthetic template and sequenced the resulting libraries to measure the specificity of each primer for the targeted V, D, or J gene segments, and to identify instances of off-target priming.

Titration experiments were performed using pools of 2-fold and 4-fold concentrations of each individual DF or JF within the context of all other primers—including the optimized mix of VF primers (e.g. 2×-fold IgHD2-08+all other equimolar DF, optimal VF mix, and JR primers) to allow us to estimate scaling factors relating primer concentration to observed template frequency.

Primer Mix Optimization

Using the cross-amplification test, the DF primers were identified as cross amplified. 12 of the DF primers were removed, resulting in a final pool of 15 DF primers. Using the scaling factors derived by titrating primers one at a time, alternative primer mixes were developed in which the primers were combined at uneven concentrations to minimize amplification bias. The revised primer mixes were then used to amplify the template pool and measure the residual amplification bias. This process was iterated, reducing or increasing each primer concentration appropriately based on whether templates amplified by that primer were over or under-represented in the previous round of results. At each stage of this iterative process, the overall degree of amplification bias was determined by calculating metrics for the dynamic range (max bias/min bias) and sum of squares (SS, calculated on log(bias) values), and iterated the process of adjusting primer concentrations until there was minimal improvement between iterations. The final primer mix has substantially less primer bias than an equimolar primer mix.

FIG. 12 shows IGH primer iterations for synthetic IGH VJ templates graphed against relative amplification bias. Relative amplification bias was determined for 1116 synthetic IGH VJ templates relative amplification bias prior to chemical bias control correction (equimolar primers (black)), post chemical correction (optimized primers (dark grey)), and post chemical and computational correction (After computational adjustment (light grey)). The equimolar primers had a dynamic range of 1130, an interquartile range of 0.991, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 233. The optimized primers had a dynamic range of 129, an interquartile range of 0.732, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 88.2. The after computational adjusted primers had a dynamic range of 76.9, an interquartile range of 0.545, and a sum of squares (log bias) of 37.9.

FIG. 13 shows the relative amplification bias for 27 synthetic IGH DJ templates of the V gene. Relative amplification bias of the V gene segment is shown in three primer iterations: 1) prior to chemical bias control correction (black), 2) a first iteration of chemical correction (white), and 3) a post second iteration of chemical correction (light grey).

Example 11 TCRG VJ Primer Iterations

In other embodiments, TCRG VJ primers were tested for relative amplification bias in multiple primer iterations. FIGS. 14a-d show TCRG-primer iterations for 55 synthetic TCRG VJ templates. Relative amplification bias was determined for the TCRG VJ primers prior to chemical bias control correction (FIG. 14a ), a first iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14b ), a second iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14c ), and final iteration of chemical correction (FIG. 14d ).

Example 12 Alternative Bias Control and Spike-in Method

In other embodiments, alternative methods can be used to determine amplification bias. Two primary goals of the method are as follows: (1) to remove amplification bias in a multiplex PCR amplification of BCR or TCR genes and (2) to estimate the fraction of B or T cells in the starting template.

The method includes starting with a set of cells comprising DNA, or cDNA (mRNA) extracted from a sample that includes B and/or T cells. In a sample comprising cells, the DNA is extracted using methods standard in the art.

The extracted DNA is divided into multiple parts and put into different PCR wells. In some embodiments, one well is used to full capacity or thousands of wells can be used. In one embodiment, 188 wells are used for PCR (two 96 well plates). The number of TCR or BCR templates per well should be sparse, such that it is rare to have multiple molecules from the same clonotype in the same well.

The method then includes amplifying the DNA separately in each well using the same multiplex set of primers. The sets of primers described herein can be used. As described above, the bar coding method is applied to the amplified molecules in each well with the same barcode sequence. For example, each well gets its own barcode.

The molecules are then sequenced on a high throughput sequencing machine with a sufficient amount of the amplified BCR or TCR sequences to identify by sequence the V and the J chain used, as well as the bar code sequence.

Each well has an average copy count. Since each clonotype appears once in a well, the amount of that template relative to the average is the bias for that V-J combination. Since V and J bias are independent, not every V-J combination is necessary to determine the biases. These relative biases are then used to either re-design primers that are either highly under or over amplifying or to titrate the primer concentration to increase or decrease amplification. The entire process is repeated with a new primer lot and iterated to continue to decrease bias.

After any cycle of the iterations, a set of computational factors (the relative amplification factors) can be applied to remove bias. Bias can be reduced by both (or either) primer changes and computational correction.

The method includes computing a fraction of nucleated cells from a similar assay. For each well, each clonotype is identified, and the number of sequencing reads is determined for each clone. In some embodiments, the number of templates does not need to be sparse. The read counts for each clone are corrected by the bias control factors as described above.

A histogram is created of the corrected read counts, and the graph has a primary mode (the amplification factor). This mode is identified by inspection (based on identification of the first large peak), or by Fourier transform, or other known methods.

The total number of corrected reads in each well is divided by the amplification factor for that well. This is the estimated number of TCR or BCR genome templates that were in the well. The total number of BCR or TCRs from the sample is the sum of the number from all the wells. The total number of genomes in each well is measured prior to PCR. This can be done by nanodrop, or other known methods used to quantify DNA. The measured weight of the DNA is divided by the weight of a double stranded genome (for example, in humans ˜6.2 pico grams).

The fraction of B cells or T cells in the sample is the total number of BCR or TCRs in the samples divided by the total number of double stranded DNA molecules added to the reaction. The result needs a minor correction as a small fraction of T cells have both alleles rearranged. This correction factor is approximately 15% for alpha beta T cells, 10% for B cells. For gamma delta T cells, almost all of the cells have both alleles rearranged, so the correction is a factor of two.

These additional methods can determine amplification bias in a multiplex PCR amplification of BCR or TCR genes and be used to estimate the fraction of B or T cells in the starting template.

The various embodiments described above can be combined to provide further embodiments. All of the U.S. patents, U.S. patent application publications, U.S. patent applications, foreign patents, foreign patent applications and non-patent publications referred to in this specification and/or listed in the Application Data Sheet are incorporated herein by reference, in their entirety. Aspects of the embodiments can be modified, if necessary to employ concepts of the various patents, applications and publications to provide yet further embodiments.

These and other changes can be made to the embodiments in light of the above-detailed description. In general, in the following claims, the terms used should not be construed to limit the claims to the specific embodiments disclosed in the specification and the claims, but should be construed to include all possible embodiments along with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled. Accordingly, the claims are not limited by the disclosure. 

1-34. (canceled)
 35. A method for quantifying a plurality of rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or a plurality of adaptive immune receptors in a biological sample that comprises rearranged nucleic acid molecules from lymphoid cells of a mammalian subject, each adaptive immune receptor comprising a variable (V) region and a joining (J) region, the method comprising: (A) amplifying nucleic acid molecules in a multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) that comprises: (1) rearranged nucleic acid molecules from the biological sample that comprises lymphoid cells of the mammalian subject, (2) a composition, comprising a plurality of synthetic template oligonucleotides comprising sequences of rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding one or more adaptive immune receptors and at least one unique oligonucleotide barcode sequence such that each synthetic template oligonucleotide has a unique oligonucleotide sequence and wherein a known number of each of the plurality of synthetic template oligonucleotides having a unique oligonucleotide sequence is present, (3) an oligonucleotide amplification primer set comprising: comprising a plurality of V-segment oligonucleotide primers and a plurality of J-segment oligonucleotide primers, wherein the primer set is capable of promoting amplification in said multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of (i) substantially all synthetic template oligonucleotides in the composition to produce a multiplicity of amplified synthetic template oligonucleotides, said multiplicity of amplified synthetic template nucleic acid molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the synthetic template oligonucleotides in the composition, and (ii) substantially all rearranged nucleic acid molecules encoding adaptive immune receptors in the biological sample to produce a multiplicity of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules, said multiplicity of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules being sufficient to quantify diversity of the rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the nucleic acid from the biological sample, (B) quantitatively sequencing said amplified synthetic template oligonucleotides and said amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules to quantify (i) a synthetic template product number of amplified template oligonucleotides which contain the at least one unique oligonucleotide barcode sequence, and (ii) a rearranged product number of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules which lack a unique oligonucleotide barcode sequence; (C) calculating an amplification factor by dividing the synthetic template product number of (B)(i) by the known number of each of the plurality of synthetic template oligonucleotides having at least one unique barcode oligonucleotide sequence of (A)(2); and (D) dividing the rearranged product number of (B)(ii) by the amplification factor calculated in (C) to quantify the number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the sample.
 36. The method of claim 35, wherein the quantified number of unique adaptive immune receptor encoding rearranged nucleic acid molecules in the sample is the number of unique B cell or unique T cell genome templates in the sample. 37-46. (canceled)
 47. The method of claim 35, wherein each V-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segment.
 48. The method of claim 35, wherein each J-segment primer comprises a nucleotide sequence of at least 15 contiguous nucleotides that is complementary to at least one functional adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segment.
 49. The method of claim 35, wherein each amplified nucleic acid molecule in the plurality of amplified synthetic template oligonucleotides and in the plurality of amplified rearranged nucleic acid molecules is less than 1000 nucleotides in length.
 50. The method of claim 35, wherein said oligonucleotide amplification primer set does not include oligonucleotide primers that specifically hybridize to a V-region pseudogene or orphon or a J-region pseudogene or orphon.
 51. The method of claim 35, wherein said plurality of synthetic template oligonucleotides each comprises an oligonucleotide sequence of the general formula: 5′-U1-B1-V-B2-R-B3-J-B4-U2-3′  [I] wherein: (a) V is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising at least 20 and not more than 1000 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor variable (V) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and each V comprising a unique V-region oligonucleotide sequence; (b) J is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising at least 15 and not more than 600 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor joining (J) region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof, and each J comprising a unique J-region oligonucleotide sequence; (c) U1 is either nothing or comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is selected from (i) a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence and (ii) a first sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a first universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence; (d) U2 is either nothing or comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is selected from (i) a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence, and (ii) a second sequencing platform-specific oligonucleotide sequence that is linked to and positioned 5′ to a second universal adaptor oligonucleotide sequence; (e) at least one of B1, B2, B3, and B4 is present and each of B1, B2, B3, and B4 comprises an oligonucleotide comprising a barcode sequence of 3-25 contiguous nucleotides, that uniquely identifies, as a paired combination, (i) the unique V-region oligonucleotide sequence of (a) and (ii) the unique J-region oligonucleotide sequence of (b); (f) R is either nothing or comprises a restriction enzyme recognition site that comprises an oligonucleotide sequence that is absent from (a)-(e); and (g) one or more unique random polynucleotide sequences positioned between or within components of formula I.
 52. The method of claim 51, wherein the one or more unique random polynucleotide sequences each comprises at least 2 contiguous nucleotides.
 53. The method of claim 51, wherein the plurality of synthetic template oligonucleotides comprises a number of at least a or at least b unique oligonucleotide sequences, whichever is larger, wherein a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the subject, and the composition comprises at least one synthetic template oligonucleotide for each unique V-region oligonucleotide sequence and at least one synthetic template oligonucleotide for each unique J-region oligonucleotide sequence.
 54. The method of claim 53, wherein a ranges from 1 to a number of maximum V gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject.
 55. The method of claim 53, wherein b ranges from 1 to a number of maximum J gene segments in the mammalian genome of the subject.
 56. The method of claim 53, wherein the plurality of template oligonucleotides comprises at least (a×b) unique oligonucleotide sequences, where a is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor V region-encoding gene segments in the mammalian subject and b is the number of unique adaptive immune receptor J region-encoding gene segments in the mammalian subject, and the composition comprises at least one template oligonucleotide for every possible combination of a V region-encoding gene segment and a J region-encoding gene segment.
 57. The method of claim 51, wherein J comprises an oligonucleotide sequence comprising a constant region of the adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence.
 58. The method of claim 35, wherein the one or more adaptive immune receptors is selected from the group consisting of TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, and IGL.
 59. The method of claim 51, wherein the V oligonucleotide sequence of (a) encodes a TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, or IGL receptor V-region polypeptide.
 60. The method of claim 51, wherein the J oligonucleotide sequence of (b) encodes a TCRB, TCRG, TCRA, TCRD, IGH, IGK, or IGL receptor J-region polypeptide.
 61. The method of claim 51, further comprising a stop codon sequence between V and B2.
 62. The method of claim 51, wherein V is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising at least 30 contiguous nucleotides of the adaptive immune receptor V region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.
 63. The method of claim 51, wherein V is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising not more than 500 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor V region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.
 64. The method of claim 51, wherein J is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising at least 16 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.
 65. The method of claim 51, wherein J is an oligonucleotide sequence comprising not more than 500 contiguous nucleotides of an adaptive immune receptor J region encoding gene sequence, or the complement thereof.
 66. The method of claim 51, wherein each synthetic template oligonucleotide is less than 1000 nucleotides in length.
 67. The method of claim 51, wherein said one or more additional unique random polynucleotide sequences each comprises at least 2 contiguous nucleotides. 